


Mystalt Fluffcember

by HeavenlyDisaster



Category: Mystalt - Fandom, The Rook (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, F/F, F/M, Ficlet, Ficlet Collection, Fluff, Fluffcember, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, One Shot, Other, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:27:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 36,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21686791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeavenlyDisaster/pseuds/HeavenlyDisaster
Summary: A collection of shorts written for Fluffcember.  All Mystalt centric.**Not compatible with any of my othercurrent WIPs.**
Relationships: Gestalt (The Rook) / Myfanwy Thomas
Comments: 63
Kudos: 78





	1. Hold Me

Gestalt had been on a hundred ops. They were experts in the field. Highest success rate in the whole of the  Checquy . When it came to competing with Vultures over targets they very rarely lost. Having multiple bodies gave them an advantage few could understand much less accept.

The target had a defensive EVA. They excelled at evasion almost as much as Gestalt excelled at apprehension. It was two days of tracking before Gestalt noticed that the Vultures had caught wind of the target. Their op moved into high gear. Competing with the  Lugat’s lackeys just as much as they were competing with the target’s EVA.

They met her in an alley in London’s West End behind a theatre. Two on either side to limit her escape routes. They held up empty hands as they moved toward her. She was younger than they’d thought. The first sighting put her around fifteen or sixteen, but the girl wasn’t more than twelve. She looked terrified.

“You don’t have total control over it right now, do you?” Gestalt used Eliza to talk to her. Girl’s typically felt safer around other girls. “Molecular relocation is a hand gift when you can use it at will, but I suspect you can’t do that yet.”

“I  _ can _ !” She backed up against the alley wall, looking between them fearfully.

“If you can, why haven’t you used it yet?” 

The girl didn’t answer. Her eyes darted around for any sort of exit. Gestalt had her boxed in.

“Come in with us. We can take you somewhere with other kids just like you. Somewhere they can teach you how to control your EVA. So that you  _ can _ use it whenever you need it.”

They’d focused entirely on the target. A rookie  mistake . They should’ve dedicated a couple pairs of eyes to the alley entrances. The sound of the gunfire was enough to give the girl what she needed to use her EVA. They divided their attention. Two bodies looked for the target while the other two looked for the source of the gunfire.

They moved for the Vulture holding the gun, but two more were running back down the alley. They were just starting to move after them when a distinct pain became noticeable. With each heartbeat, the pain grew more intense until it was crippling. They couldn’t figure out which body was the source right away. Four hands went to the spot on their back where the pain was worst. Only one came away with blood.

Teddy’s.

They knew they needed to call it in. They should grab their phones, but they were in such pain that their thoughts had blurred. They managed to pull one of their phones from their pocket and dialed the first number they saw.

“Gestalt? Have you got her?” Myfanwy’s voice came through the line clear as a bell. A ray of sunshine in the heart of a storm.

“Agent down,” they managed through clenched teeth. “Medic.” They let out a whimper of pain. They couldn’t really feel their Teddy body just then. That was scary.

“Are you okay?” Myfanwy shouted something at Ingrid Gestalt couldn’t make out through the rush of blood in their ears as they tried to get a sense of their Teddy body. “Gestalt, talk to me!”

“Medic.”

They moved to their body and began what emergency medical treatment they could remember. They took Alex’s tracksuit jacket and used it to staunch the bleeding. There was no exit wound which meant the bullet was still inside them. They’d been shot before, but not like this. Not where it counted.

Their compartmentalization was shot. They couldn’t drive themselves back to the office. They climbed into the ambulance with the medics and rode back to the office in silence, working hard to overcome the panic that was coming with their inability to feel their body. 

Teddy was taken back to surgery as soon as they reached the  Checquy . They needed to stay with him, but no one understood that. Their lack of comprehension had never infuriated Gestalt quite as much as it did in that moment. They couldn’t  _ feel themselves _ . The only comfort they’d had in the last hour had been the ability to see and hear their body breathing.

They stood in the waiting room, pacing. Trying desperately to find their injured body. Trying to figure out if they were alive or dead. And if they were dead, did that mean they’d have this pain in them for the rest of their lives? 

“Gestalt?” 

Alex was the only body  sitting. There was a slightly stronger link between the twin bodies. They thought if they concentrated hard enough, they could find Teddy again. Myfanwy sat beside them on the uncomfortable couch in the waiting room and grabbed their hand in both of hers immediately. It was a relief. To feel something in every body that wasn’t excruciating pain it was like heroin. It allowed a moment of peace where they could breathe steadily with each of their bodies.

“What can I do?” She squeezed their hand between hers. “Anything you need. I want to help.”

What they needed was for the doctors to let them into the OR with their body. They needed their Teddy body to wake up and live. They needed things that Myfanwy had no way to give them. She stared up at them with her big, blue eyes. She was scared, too.

“Hold me?” They should have been embarrassed at the simpering way they begged. They were in too much pain to care.

Myfanwy’s hands released theirs and she pulled them to her chest. Her hands rubbed up and down Alex’s back. Each pass over the spot the bullet had struck Teddy lessened the pain in their three conscious bodies. They clung to her like a child clung to its mother. They should have felt stupid. Silly. They only felt safe.

The surgery took five hours. They put them on a morphine drip and set them up in a private room. Myfanwy stayed with them the first night. And the second. On the third day, feeling returned to that body and they opened their eyes again. Relief ran deep. Even the slight ache was a comfort. They were alive.


	2. First Snow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set half a year after the events of the Rook season 1, Myfanwy struggles with trying to find a bit of normalcy in her new life. Along with trying to figure out Gestalt's motives the whole time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not compatible with any of my other WIPs.

People were beginning to trust her again. About fucking time. She’d been bending over backwards to please everyone. Make Grantchester see that she was still useful. Convince Ingrid she wasn’t completely incapable. And then whatever energy she had left went into trying to win Gestalt back over. She’d been a total shit to them her first week, but she figured they’d come around eventually.

To their credit, Gestalt was not outwardly antagonistic. They veered more toward the passive-aggressive route. Especially when they went into one of their ‘moods.’ Generally during one of the private anniversaries they shared with the other Myfanwy. Ones she had no way of knowing, but they expected her to anyway. And when she inevitably didn’t, they’d go out of their way to avoid her for a day or two leaving Myfanwy to wonder what she’d fucked  up this time.

She came into work early most mornings. She never beat Ingrid no matter how early she came in so she was never really able to get ahead of things. She spent the past six months relearning her old job. Grantchester had deemed her a valuable enough asset to keep on provided she also spend her weekends at New  Glengrove learning to control her powers.

She had no time off. No breaks. No quiet moments just for herself. Six months of it had run her ragged. She sank into her desk and began reviewing the expense reports Ingrid had left for her. She sighed heavily and readied herself for another ten or so hours of writing and typing until her hand cramped. At eleven thirty, Ingrid knocked on her office door before wheeling in with a stack of papers.

“You don’t have to worry about these just yet. Most are already finished and are just waiting on your signature. Gestalt wants to know if you’ll meet them downstairs with your coat. I’ll have another stack ready by the time you get through with those. Send Gestalt a message if you won’t be down. I’m going to grab a bite myself.” Ingrid gave her an easy smile and rolled back to her own office to get her coat and purse.

Myfanwy fidgeted at her desk. She didn’t know just what Gestalt wanted from her. After the whole business at Victor  Donolov’s she thought they’d forgiven her. Or at least had wanted the chance to try and forgive her. As the days, weeks, and months rolled by she found herself doubting very much that Gestalt would have missed her at all if she had left with Linda and Bronwyn. She pressed her fingers into her temples and shut her eyes.

“Okay,” she said quietly to herself. She pushed herself to her feet and grabbed her coat. 

There were two Gestalt bodies waiting at the ground level corridor. Eliza and Alex. Their backs were to her. Fingers at their mouths. She knew it was a nervous habit. She wondered what she’d done to make Gestalt nervous. If she was quick, she could turn around and go right back upstairs before they....

Eliza turned and caught sight of her. Their smiles were small. Uncertain. Insincere. “You came.”

Myfanwy shrugged noncommittally. “It’s lunchtime. Not like I had anywhere to be.”

It was the wrong thing to say judging by their expressions. Alex’s head ducked down so she couldn’t see his face anymore. Myfanwy tucked her hair behind her ear and shifted her weight from foot to foot. She wrapped her arms around her belly.

“Did you... do you need something from me?”

Gestalt was pensive a minute before that same insincere smile crossed Eliza’s lips. “Would you like to get lunch?”

Myfanwy hugged her arms around herself tighter. “Sounds great.”

She followed Gestalt out of the building. Security was easier to get out of than to get in. They didn’t do a full body scan and only did a cursory check of personal belongings. Myfanwy’s personal belongings were all in her office upstairs. She hadn’t anticipated going out. She seldom did.

The temperature had dropped significantly in the time between going into work that morning and leaving it that afternoon. Myfanwy buttoned her coat up as high as it would go, but her ears were still exposed. She shivered and started for the parking garage, but Gestalt was walking in the opposite direction. Myfanwy frowned and followed.

They walked about ten minutes before ducking inside a small restaurant. Myfanwy’s hands were bright red by then. She rubbed them together and tried to get her circulation working again. Teddy and Robert were already at a table in the back. Myfanwy stared at them all for a moment before sitting at the edge of her seat nearest the door.

Things were quiet while they ordered. Quieter while they ate. Myfanwy had to wonder why it was they had asked her to lunch in the first place. She was suddenly afraid this was some anniversary she had forgotten. Another reason for Gestalt to hate her. The first day they met. The day they survived a  Glengrove torture experiment. The day they were promoted to Rooks. The day they started at the Checquy. She had no idea. She was beginning to panic.

Gestalt cleared their throats and grew shifty. Myfanwy’s panic increased. Teddy reached into the inside pocket of his suit jacket. Myfanwy didn’t think they’d hurt her. She’d been putting forth every effort to prove herself indispensable. Unless she’d failed somehow.

Teddy set a box on the table in front of her. A red bow adorned the top of the black velvet. Myfanwy stared down at it for a beat before looking up at Gestalt in confusion. Seeing no answers there, her hands went to the box. She slipped the ribbon off and flipped the lid open. A pretty golden bracelet sat in a bed of red velvet. What must’ve been real diamonds were inlaid in each link around the bracelet. She lifted it from the box and watched the play of lights across the gemstones.

“It’s beautiful.” She turned her attention back to Gestalt. “But why are you giving this to me?”

She’d said the wrong thing again. She set the bracelet back in its box and stared at her lap.

“It’s your birthday.” 

Myfanwy looked up and around the table in surprise. “Mine?”

They nodded. “I thought you’d at least remember your own birthday if you remembered nothing else.”

“Suppose not.”

“Yeah, sorry.” Myfanwy stood and grabbed her coat. She wanted to cry. Gestalt made it seem like they were the only ones that wanted her memory to come back. Like she wasn’t even trying

“No, I’m sorry, Myfanwy. I just hoped....” They sighed. Myfanwy left the box on the table and made her way back out into the blustery weather.

Myfanwy felt a raindrop hit her cheek. More like ice than rain. She brushed it away, but two more took its place. Myfanwy looked up in momentary confusion. It was snowing. Actual snow.

“Myfanwy, wait!” Eliza shouted after her. Myfanwy heard Eliza’s footsteps growing closer behind her. Her small hand snagged Myfanwy’s elbow and pulled her to a stop. “I’m sorry.”

“You aren’t the only one trying to recover my memories. I try every day. But it’s not like I have a lot of time to devout to figuring out my past now, do I? I have fucking EVA training every weekend and mountains of paperwork every other day of the fucking week. I’ve been going out of my way to put my life back together after what happened. Your little jabs don’t help in the slightest.”

Gestalt winced. The other three bodies came to join them on the sidewalk. “Myfanwy, I’m sorry. I know I’ve not been the most helpful. I just wanted to see if your memories would come back normally. Like the memory you told me about in your letter.”

“Well, they haven’t!” Myfanwy took a breath to calm down. “Not... not the memories you’re looking for anyway.”

“But you have remembered something?”

“A few things here and there.” She shrugged.

“Why didn’t you tell me?’

Myfanwy glared at them. “When was I supposed to be telling you about them? When you were ignoring me or when you were avoiding me?”

Gestalt grimaced. “Alright. I deserve that, I suppose.”

“You deserve more than that. Lucky for you, I have yet another stack of paperwork to get back to.” She turned to leave, but Gestalt grabbed her wrist. She spun back around ready to slap or punch them if need be, but Gestalt let go the next second. Myfanwy huffed and stormed back to the office in the softly dancing snow. A happier weather mood than she felt just then.

She slipped her arms out of her coat and sat down before she noticed it. The reason Gestalt had pulled her back. They’d fastened her birthday bracelet to her wrist. Myfanwy played with it on her wrist, twisting it back and forth. That was when Myfanwy noticed the inscription on one of the links. Myfanwy turned the bracelet over and held it under her desk lamp. 

_ Cała _ __ _ moja _ __ _ miłość _

A quick internet search gave her a translation. ‘All my love.’

She smiled and pulled out the first of her stack of forms. She had hope. Just enough to keep her working through her tedious re-entry into the  Checquy as a trusted senior agent. Inside she was dancing just like the flurries of the first snow were dancing outside her office window.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to post 2 a day until I catch up.  
> The Polish is probably not right. I used Google to translate. Sorry.


	3. Blizzard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy, Robert, and Eliza get trapped in a blizzard outside of London.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really tried to focus on the Fluff aspect of Fluffcember and it went smutty. One of these days, though.

In the field training. A fancy way of saying job shadowing. She was shadowing Gestalt. Eliza and Robert at least. Teddy and Alex were tucked away at the office doing routine work while she was trapped in a car for more than two hours in the middle of winter to interview the family of a potential target. Eliza was driving while Robert sat in the backseat reading through the report.

“Why interview the family at all?” Myfanwy demanded after an hour’s silence.

Gestalt’s brows pulled together, but they didn’t look away from the road. “We just need to verify the potential target’s identity and hopefully learn the extent of their current abilities.”

“But why would they tell us anything at all? The rumors about  Glengrove and the  Checquy are not kind ones. Isn’t a parent’s first instinct to protect their children?” 

Gestalt was quiet a moment. “Most of these families are... unsettled by the abilities their children display. Many of them offer the EVAs up freely.”

Myfanwy waited for them to tell her they were joking. They didn’t. She was horrified. Disgusted. What sort of parent just chucked their kid into the first open hands at the first sight of trouble? But there was something in Gestalt’s voice just then. Something hollow.

“Is that how you came to the  Checquy ?” She guessed.

Eliza took her eyes off the road to look at her with a small smile. “Four crying children is hard enough on any parent even without them being EVAs.”

Myfanwy reached over to cover their hand on the steering wheel. “I’m sorry.”

Eliza squeezed her fingers before moving them back to her lap. “Don’t be sorry. If my mother had done anything different, I may have never met you.”

“ _ That _ would be the real tragedy.” Robert confirmed from behind her.

Myfanwy was startled by how normal the family appeared. Gestalt showed their badges at the door and introduced Myfanwy as a trainee. The parents were slightly wary, but they let the trio in. The wife went to put the kettle on while the husband sat with them in the living area.

The house was clean. Pristine. Everything was in its proper place. Well. Almost everything. There were elaborate frames on the walls where paintings and photographs must’ve been. Now, they hung empty. It was the only abnormal thing Myfanwy could see in the house. The wife came back with a tea tray to set between them.

Gestalt pulled out a notepad and pen with Robert’s body while preparing a cup of tea with the other. Myfanwy thought perhaps she should have brought a pad and pen, too. Too late now. She shifted in her seat and stared at the empty frames on the walls.

“Your son’s name is Tyler?” Robert started.

“That’s right.” 

“How old is he?” 

“Seven.” The husband was the only one answering while the wife stayed glued tight to his side.

“You stated some unusual abilities, would you mind elaborating on those?” Eliza asked, gently.

The husband cleared his throat and adjusted himself on the couch opposite them. “I’d say it came out of nowhere. We didn’t know what it was at first. Things break around him? I guess. Shatter. I replaced the window in his room three times already.”

Robert was scribbling in his notepad. Eliza frowned thoughtfully. 

“What’s going on with the picture frames?” Myfanwy blurted.

The husband and wife both turned to look at Myfanwy. She swallowed, but stood by her question. It was weird. The husband let out a heavy breath.

“Unrelated.”

Myfanwy frowned. She was going to argue, but Gestalt spoke over her. “Is Tyler available? We’d like to assess him personally.”

“He’s... staying with his grandparents for the time being.”

Myfanwy felt a horrible resentment towards the couple. They thought they were scared? Tyler was seven and likely terrified by the new abilities he was finding. Instead of being loving and supportive the way parents were  _ meant _ to be, they were trying to shirk their responsibilities. Looking to send him away as soon as they could. Making him stay with his grandparents before never seeing any of his family ever again. It was despicable.

Gestalt got the address for Tyler’s grandparents before they got back in their car. It was another half an hour drive out to Wolverhampton. A light snow was starting to come down as they drove. The grandparents had been informed of their visit as soon as they’d left Tyler’s parent’s house. They were welcomed in cheerily and sat down in the front room.

Tyler seemed a perfectly normal child. If not a bit understandably sad. His parents had abandoned him at the first show of trouble. They spent a half an hour talking with Tyler and trying to gauge the extent of his EVA. They called in for an escort for him to  Glengrove before taking their leave. The snow had gotten worse as they drove back towards London.

They only made it as far as Birmingham before it became clear that they weren’t getting much further. Gestalt sighed and pulled into a nearby hotel and shut off the car.

“Weatherman says it’s whiteout conditions. High winds and an expected snowfall of eighteen centimeters,” Gestalt explained. 

“Should clear by the morning, though.” 

Myfanwy nodded and unfastened her seatbelt. “Pretty close to Tyler’s parent’s house,” she muttered.

Eliza grabbed her elbow and pulled her to a stop in the middle of the blizzard. “I know you’re mad at them, but you need to stay rational. Focused. This is part of the job, alright?”

Myfanwy pressed her lips together and turned for the hotel lobby. There was a line at the concierge desk. Six more people stranded by the blizzard. Myfanwy sat on one of the couches in the lobby with Eliza while Robert waited to book them a couple of rooms for the night. Myfanwy picked up a magazine and tried to distract herself.

A few minutes later, Robert stopped in front of her. Eliza was already standing. Myfanwy shut her magazine and dropped it on the coffee table. She held her hand out for a key.

“They’re at capacity.”

“Because of the blizzard.”

Myfanwy stared between them. “So?”

Robert held up a single card key. “We’ve only got one room.”

Myfanwy stared. “You’re joking.” 

Gestalt chewed at the inside of their lower lips.

“You’re not joking.”

They turned for the lifts wordlessly. Myfanwy stared after them for another few seconds before begrudgingly following after them. They hadn’t been exactly romantic in the months following her memory loss. Not that they weren’t attentive. Gestalt took her to at least two old haunts a week to try and jog some memories loose. It very rarely worked, but the time together was nice. Still, of all the  _ many _ opportunities they had, Gestalt never even kissed her.

Now they were just going to share a hotel room together. No big deal.

They didn’t have any luggage. No overnight bags. They hadn’t anticipated staying overnight anywhere. The blizzard had cropped up seemingly from nowhere. A light snow had been all that was in the forecast. Myfanwy stared at the king-sized bed and mentally strangled the weatherman.

Gestalt moved around the room taking stock of everything. Eliza ducked into the bathroom to snoop around there, too. Myfanwy moved stiffly into the room just to be out of the way. Robert pulled open one of the drawers on the nightstand. Myfanwy watched him move to the window and pull the blinds up to look out. It was barely two, but they couldn’t even see to the other side of the road. Robert dropped the blinds down again and pulled the curtains together.

“I think there’s a restaurant downstairs.” Eliza moved to stand beside her.

She nodded her agreement and they went out in search of food. The restaurant was just as busy as the hotel. Everyone was waiting out the storm. Myfanwy was trying to decide if she was more excited to be alone in a private room all night with Gestalt or if she was dreading it. She kept looking at Gestalt waiting for them to comment on their situation in any way. It might be easier for her to decide if they just gave her some sort of sign.

By the time it was time to sleep, Myfanwy still hadn’t gotten any clearer on their intentions. Or her own. They talked about Tyler and what the standard procedure was for procuring targets this way. What would happen once he was enrolled in New  Glengrove . What his parents would be told. If she had to guess, Myfanwy would say they were avoiding any conversation leading to their sleeping arrangement.

“It’s a big bed at least,” Gestalt murmured at last. They stood staring at the bed while Myfanwy sat taking her boots off.

Myfanwy looked over at the mattress. “We could probably get Alex and Teddy on it, too.”

Gestalt’s heads snapped up. Myfanwy didn’t know why, but a blush started at her neck and moved up towards her cheeks. She bent her head to finish the laces on her boots and set them aside. She tucked her fingers into the front pockets on her jeans and bit her lip.

“Shame we didn’t know about the blizzard. I didn’t bring any pajamas.”

Gestalt looked away and swallowed hard. Myfanwy took a small step forward, feeling bolder.

“You’ve seen me naked already, though. Isn’t that right?” 

Eliza’s eyes widened while Robert looked everywhere else except where she was.

“What I mean is, I don’t really like sleeping in my jeans. That’s not a problem, right?”

Eliza opened her mouth, but no sound came out. They coughed and both of them moved away from her. Myfanwy gritted her teeth against the embarrassment and irritation that came with being jilted. Especially since she thought Gestalt wanted her. 

“Why do you do that?” She demanded, her annoyance saturating her words.

“Do what?” Eliza asked.

“Keep me at arm’s length. Or push me away altogether.” Myfanwy glared between them. “I told you I wanted to try. I came back because I thought  _ you  _ wanted to try, too.”

“It’s not right.”

“Why? What’s wrong with it? Because I’m different from the Myfanwy you cared about?” Myfanwy squeezed her eyes shut to lock in the tears welling up in frustration.

“No!” They moved closer to her again. “No, it’s got nothing to do with that.”

“But I’m practically a stranger to you.”

Myfanwy scoffed. “I’ve known you for months. Years if we count those scattered memories I have of us.”

“I don’t.”

Myfanwy huffed. “So, this is....” She trailed off. Completely unwilling to finish that thought.

“Do you know how hard it is for me to hold myself back from you?” Gestalt whispered. They brushed the backs of their fingers down her cheek and settled their hand on the crook of her neck.

“Then stop.”

Gestalt hesitated another second before Robert’s mouth fell on hers. Myfanwy’s arms went around them to hold them to her. She sighed into their mouth giving them the opportunity to delve their tongue between her lips to stroke hers.

Myfanwy set at the buttons on Robert’s shirt. She moved frantically. She wanted them so much. More than she’d wanted anyone. Eliza’s hands gathered up the hem of her t-shirt. Myfanwy pushed Robert’s shirt off his shoulders and raised her hands over her head so they could relieve her of her own. Topless, she turned to catch  Eliza’s bottom lip between her own.

Robert kissed the back of her neck and down her shoulder while his hands undid the fly on her jeans and pushed them down. Myfanwy cupped Eliza’s face between her hands and deepened their kiss. Robert knelt behind her to help her feet from her jeans. Once she was fully nude, they moved her to the bed.

Myfanwy unzipped the back of Eliza’s dress and pulled it down her arms. Robert growled while Eliza sighed. Robert moved between her legs peppering kisses up from her knees. Myfanwy kissed down  Eliza’s neck while Eliza’s soft fingers pinched Myfanwy’s nipples until they were hard as pearls.

“You-you’ve got... something. Right?” Myfanwy panted against Eliza’s neck.

Gestalt pulled back. “I... no.” They looked ashamed at being without a prophylactic at this auspicious time. Myfanwy bit her cheek.

“Okay. That’s... okay.”

“What?”

“No. I meant.... We don’t have to  stop, we just have to make use of one body over the other.”

Gestalt stared at her for a moment before comprehension caught up. Eliza pulled her face back to hers, kissing her deeply. Robert moved away to sit on the chair in the corner. Myfanwy came around Eliza’s fingers while working to wring an orgasm from Gestalt herself. 

Myfanwy felt wholly satisfied by the time Robert came to lay beside her on the bed to sleep. She just wasn’t sure she’d managed to give that same satisfaction to Gestalt. No matter how hard she’d tried.

Robert picked up her hand and kissed the back of it before curling toward her and falling asleep, holding her hand to his cheek. Eliza did the same with the other hand. Myfanwy smiled at the drawn curtains knowing the snow behind it had likely stopped. Not that it mattered. The blizzard had done its job.


	4. Power Outage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy and Gestalt are trapped together in the Checquy's offices.

Gestalt had a hard time admitting when they were wrong. That was a character flaw they were trying to work on. When they had time. Or when they remembered. Okay, so they were doing a pretty shit job of working on it. What was that thing people said? The first step to recovery was admitting you had a problem. Gestalt admitted they had a hard time admitting when they were wrong. 

Fat lot of good it did when it came to getting on Myfanwy’s bad side. 

_You need to stop talking._

_Now._

_Alright. Now._

_Seriously. Shut up._

_“_ Are you fucking kidding me? You really want to blame _me_ for all this?” Myfanwy raged. 

“Want has nothing to do with it. Fact is, this is your mess and you always make me clean up after you!” 

“As if I haven’t got better things to do with my time!” 

“Go fucking away then!” 

“How am I meant to do that? Huh? You put the power out in the whole fucking building!” 

“TAKE THE FUCKING STAIRS!” 

“The doors are on electronic locks, genius. You trapped us here.” 

“Well, _I_ didn’t design the fucking building!” 

_Just... just shut up._

_Stop arguing with her._

_You’re in a government facility. The power will be back on in no time._

Myfanwy moved away from them and the windows and disappeared into the inky blackness of the empty office floor. It was almost midnight. Myfanwy had gotten it into her head that she could learn everything she needed to about her past self by reading each and every document that mentioned her. Even if it was only as a signature on an expense report. 

Gestalt had thought it was endearing at first. How hard she was trying to remember every facet of her past life. She’d pleaded with them to help her try and remember and they’d managed to wrest free a memory or two, but for the most part, she remained a blank slate. 

They had come back to the office after Conrad had let them know Myfanwy was still there when he left. Gestalt only wanted her to get some rest. Take care of herself better than her past self had managed it. It was the only reason they’d proposed her forgetting about trying to recover her memories. It wasn’t working and she was running herself ragged. 

Alright, so there might have been a better way to phrase it than they had. Hell, in hindsight, they could have said exactly that. But hindsight is twenty-twenty and Gestalt tended to live in the present. As much as possible anyway. 

_Oh no, you had to tell her it was a ‘pointless endeavor.’_

_Had to say she was wasting her time and everyone’s resources._

_Your exact words? The words that pissed her off so much?_

_“Get over it and move on.”_

_Absolutely genius, there._

_Top class._

_Dickwad._

_That should’ve been the last time you opened your mouth other than to apologize._

_And now you’re trapped in an office with a pissed off Myfanwy._

They slumped into chairs near the windows and waited for Myfanwy to come back. Maybe they could apologize. Or something close to it. It was raining outside. The drops hitting the windows made a pretty melody. Myfanwy came back in with a flashlight. 

“Where’d you find that?” 

“Conrad’s office.” She sat down behind her desk and clicked the light on. 

“You shouldn’t be in there.” 

Myfanwy glared at them. “You shouldn’t be _here_.” 

Gestalt rolled their heads back on their shoulders and sighed. “Alright. Maybe I was a bit harsh before.” 

“Maybe?” 

Gestalt pressed their lips together. “Okay. I could have phrased it better.” 

“Unlikely.” 

“Can you just.... I’m trying to apologize here.” 

Myfanwy sat back in her chair and shined her flashlight at Teddy’s face. “Is that what you’re doing? Because it sounded an awful lot like you gearing up to blame me some more.” 

They bit all four tongues as they tried to think through the right thing to say in this situation. At the very least they wanted to find the least worst thing to say. They chewed at their fingers as they tried to find a way to phrase what they wanted to say that wasn’t a complete insult to Myfanwy’s person. 

“You know you don’t have to be her anymore.” 

Myfanwy flipped a page in the report she was reading before looking up at them again. “What’s that?” 

“Your first memories are you trying to be your past self, but you don’t have to try to be her anymore.” 

“Everyone knows what happened. Everyone’s seen the tapes.” 

“Great.” Myfanwy dropped her attention back to her report. 

“I mean you don’t have to try so hard. You can just be you as you are.” 

“Isn’t that what you wanted? To figure out who you are?” 

Myfanwy sighed and clicked the flashlight off. “I want.... I don’t know. Feels like I’m letting everyone down.” 

They moved Teddy to sit at the corner of her desk. “How could you be letting anyone down?” 

Myfanwy sighed heavily. “I think... I got your hopes up. When I remembered that training thing.” 

Gestalt grabbed her hand and held it between theirs. “I’ll be honest, I did like reading about that. I got sick after that day so it wasn’t one of my fondest memories, but it’s probably one of the best memories I have of the institute now.” 

“But I don’t care if you never remember another day from Glengrove.” 

“Or any time before your memories were wiped.” 

“You aren’t the past Myfanwy. I don’t mean that in a bad way.” 

“I mean, I like _this_ Myfanwy. So does Ingrid and Conrad and everyone else in the office. Maybe not Linda, but we’ll never know for sure.” Teddy smiled down at her. 

A reluctant smile pulled at her mouth. They slid from the desk and bent to kiss her. Myfanwy’s hands went around the back of their neck. The lights flicked back on and the office hummed with electricity again. Myfanwy pulled back and giggled. 

“Maybe we should go home now?” 

Gestalt didn’t let go of her. “Your place or mine?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I got pretty damn close to fluff here.


	5. Caroling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy and Gestalt spend time together.

Gestalt remembered when they’d first met Myfanwy in Glengrove. How worldly she seemed. Gestalt hadn’t known life outside the institute. In many ways, they had still been very childlike. She’d been the one to introduce them to all sorts of things. So much in fact, that the handlers had deemed her a ‘bad influence’ and attempted to separate them. It obviously didn’t work.

It was surreal to find themselves somewhat in her shoes then. She knew about most things. She still had all her old skills (and a few new ones) and basic knowledge of events. The only thing she was lacking were personal memories. She knew about winter, but she’d never seen the snow. Never felt it on her skin. She knew about Christmas, but had no memories of sitting around a tree doling out presents.

Gestalt took her into the park on a whim to see the Christmas trees all lit up. They held her gloved hand, wishing their contact was skin to skin so all their bodies could experience her hand in theirs at once. Only Alex was with her just then. The rest of them were working on a target acquisition. Their desire to keep Myfanwy comfortable and thus, warmly braced against the winter bluster, kept them from voicing their desires. They could touch her skin to skin after they got some place warm.

A chorus of carol singers started  _ God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen _ and Myfanwy tipped her head as she listened. After a moment she turned to Gestalt with a huge smile.

“I know this song!” 

They couldn’t help a small laugh coming through. Alex bent and kissed her cheek, reddened from the cold. They wrapped their arm around her slim shoulders and kissed her temple just below where her stocking cap sat. 

They took her back through the park the next night, too. Still with just the Alex body. They planned to pick up dinner and head back to their flat in time to meet their other bodies. The carolers were there again. They started up with  _ All I Want  _ _ For _ _ Christmas is You.  _ Myfanwy elbowed them in the ribs when they sang the chorus smiling sweetly.

Monday evening, they took her back to the park after work. They decided it would just be the routine until Christmas. Myfanwy liked looking at the lights on the trees. They had to send her with just the Eliza body that night. They stopped at a pop-up food cart and bought them each a cup of peppermint hot cocoa laden with marshmallows. Myfanwy took a small sip.

She looked over at them. “Did the old me like this?”

Gesalt looked down at the cocoa in her hand.  _ Maybe you should have gotten her regular. _

_ “ _ Yeah. I can get you something different.” They held out their hand for her cup, but she held it away and took another sip.

“I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I was just wondering if that was something that had changed.”

Gestalt tried to frown at her around their smile, but the smile was winning. They grabbed her hand and dropped a kiss on her lips instead. Myfanwy hummed thoughtfully.

“I think I like the way you taste better.”

Gestalt grinned on all four faces. It didn’t  matter that she could only see one of them.

The carolers were singing  _ Do You Hear What I Hear? _ as Myfanwy pulled them through the park toward her flat. She kissed them again as they waited for the lifts. A kiss felt in every inch of every body.

The next night they took her with Teddy. They bought Christmas biscuits from a bakery on the way. They stopped in the park to eat them. Myfanwy took a bite out of her mint chip flavored biscuit. It was green and looked completely unappetizing to Gestalt who chose the simple sugar that was cut and decorated to look like Santa Claus. Myfanwy looked over at their choice. They were eating much more slowly than she was.

“Does it not taste good?” She asked.

“Tastes like a normal biscuit.” They grinned as an idea caught them. They broke off the tip of Santa’s hat and pushed it at her lips. Myfanwy rolled her eyes, but opened her mouth to eat the morsel.

She smiled as the carolers started in  with _ I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus _ . “Delicious.”

They shifted between bodies. Whichever part of them was ready to leave the office the same time she was. They stopped at the park and did typical holiday activities that they would ordinarily never have participated in. For one thing, they hated carol singers. Walking the park every night after work would have been a tedious and pointless chore if not for Myfanwy at their side.

A week before Christmas, they were with Myfanwy at the park in their usual spot. She’d gone off to look at the  drinks menu at the kiosk. Someone tapped their arm. Alex’s arm. Their other bodies had taken the opportunity to do a bit of holiday shopping for her. They looked down at some older woman.

“Excuse me, I don’t mean to pry, but is that  woman your girlfriend?” She pointed to Myfanwy who was ordering something to drink.

“She is.”

The woman sighed heavily. “Well, I sing here almost every evening with the rest of the carolers and we’ve noticed.... She’s been here every day, you know? With and without you, but never alone. Do you see what I’m saying?”

Gestalt frowned at the woman. Myfanwy never came to the park alone as far as they knew. “How do you mean?”

A younger woman came up beside the older one. “She’s cheating on you. With  _ several _ people. We were taking bets on whether she was an escort or not. There’s a blonde woman and at least two other men we see her with regularly.”

Myfanwy came back over then with two cups of something. She handed one to Gestalt and smiled at their new company. The women scowled back at her. Myfanwy’s eyes widened and she looked up at Gestalt for help.

“Something amiss?”

Gestalt pressed their lips together. “Are you cheating on me?”

Myfanwy’s mouth fell open. “Excuse me?”

“They say they’ve seen you here with three other people. You’ve been stepping out on me? On  _ Christmas _ ?” 

Gestalt saw when it clicked in her head. She turned on the women. “Why don’t you mind your own business?”

“ So, it’s true!” Gestalt cried.

“No, wait, baby! You know I only love you!” Myfanwy pleaded.

She’d never called them any pet names before. Gestalt chortled with their other bodies maintaining the façade with Alex. Unfortunately, it made the bodies they were shopping with look like complete lunatics. They stormed away, tossing the full cup Myfanwy had just handed them to the ground.

They stopped just outside the park and waited for Myfanwy. She sprinted past them and stopped at the street corner. They watched her look around in confusion for a minute before they went to meet her. She beamed at them and threw herself into their arms laughing.

“Looks like we can’t go back to that park anymore,” they sighed.

Myfanwy tipped her head to the side. “Well.... We could.”

Gestalt looked down at her. She arched her brow up at her and smiled coyly.

They avoided the park for the rest of the week. On Saturday, they spent the day in bed until early evening. At the usual time, the five of them got dressed and walked to the park. Myfanwy held the hands of Alex and Eliza as they went. 

The carolers were in the middle of  _ The Twelve Days of Christmas _ when the song faltered and died out. True to the joke, they ignored the carolers and focused entirely on each other. It had to be Gestalt’s new favorite holiday memory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Took me a minute, but I think I got some real fluff here. Marshmallowy sweet fluffy.


	6. Snowball Fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Glengrove Mystalt. The early days.

“Liza,” Myfanwy whispered. The girl stirred in her bunk, but continued sleeping. Myfanwy ran her index finger down the length of her nose. “Eli-iza,” she sang.

She sniffled and huddled down deeper in her blanket before blinking her eyes open. Myfanwy was barely an inch from their face. Myfanwy grinned at them before sitting back and pulling at her blankets. Eliza’s hands fisted in the covers desperately, but Myfanwy was relentless. Myfanwy tossed the blanket over to the other side of the room.

Eliza groaned and pulled her pillow over her head. Myfanwy grabbed that, too and tried to pull it away. She let go of the pillow and Myfanwy stumbled back and landed hard on her butt. Myfanwy frowned indignantly up at Eliza who was sitting up in bed now.

“What do you want?” She hissed.

“Someone’s grouchy,” Myfanwy muttered, getting back to her feet.

“It’s barely four in the morning!” 

Myfanwy crawled onto the end of her bed and leaned forward, grinning like a fool. “Exactly! If we’re quick, we can get out to the yard before they notice.”

Eliza wrinkled her nose at Myfanwy. “Why would we do that?” 

Myfanwy rolled her eyes and pulled at Eliza’s arm. “Just get dressed. Maybe you can do your telepathy thing and get your brothers to meet us down there.”

Eliza finally started to move out of bed muttering something under her breath that Myfanwy couldn’t quite make out. Myfanwy pulled on her coat, hat, boots, and gloves while Eliza did the same. Once they were dressed, Eliza wedged the door open in the easy way that belied years of practice. They crept to the hall and moved quickly down the corridors toward the door to the yard. The boys met them at the door with the same exasperated expressions on their faces.

Myfanwy slipped out first knowing full well that the Gestalt siblings would follow her. She made for the slide and scooped up two handfuls of the heavy, wet snow that had collected on the end. She molded it into a ball in her hands and turned to watch Gestalt inspecting the inch and a half of snow that covered the ground. It would likely be melted by midday which meant this was their only chance to experience it.

“Liza!” Myfanwy called. She cranked her arm back and lobbed her snowball across the yard, hitting her in the face just as she turned to looked.

“What the....” 

Teddy and Robert were already scooping up handfuls of snow to throw back at her. She ducked behind the slide giggling and working at putting together an arsenal of snowballs. When she stood back  up she was assailed by snowballs on all sides. The impact made her drop the freshly made snowballs in her hands and covered her in the wet snow.

“Unfair!” She whined.

“Payback!” The Gestalt’s countered.

Myfanwy huffed and stamped her foot. “Four to one isn’t a fair fight!”

They frowned at her then at each other. Some telepathic deliberation happened and Alex and Robert trudged over to join her side. Myfanwy scooped up another handful of snow and compacted it down to a smallish ball. More aerodynamic. Teddy was the furthest away and she thought he was far too dry. She chucked it at him and hit him square in the chest.

Alex and Robert handed her more snowballs to throw at their brother and sister who tossed a few back as the sun climbed over the trees and hit the frozen lake. Teddy and Eliza began evasive maneuvers, dodging her throws and hiding behind the jungle gym drawing her out of hiding.

Just when she thought she’d get the drop on Eliza, Alex and Robert dumped a huge pile of snow over her head. She collapsed onto the ground and lay in the snow. She kicked Alex’s knees out from under him making him fall into the snow beside her. The other Gestalt’s came to sit beside her. They all panted heavily. Their breaths made little clouds in the cold air that vanished on their next inhale.

“Thomas! Gestalt!” They all jumped and turned to look up at the handlers standing in the doorway. “Get inside this instant.”

They pulled themselves out of the snow and trudged inside, soaking wet and freezing. They were made to stand in the hallways on one leg with cans in their outstretched hands for an hour. They were not allowed to take off their wet, snowy clothing until their punishment was completed.

None of them regretted a thing.


	7. Homemade

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy is trying to 'find herself.' Gestalt is just happy to have her there.

Myfanwy was trying to ‘find herself.’ Something that apparently included signing up for a variety of workshops around London. Some things she decided heavily against immediately. She spent all of fifteen minutes in her first improv workshop before making a hasty exit. Public performance was not her forte. Among her new activities were, a figure drawing class, yoga, pyrography, a DSLR photography class, and she just started a baking workshop.

Her past  self had been entirely consumed by her work at the  Checquy . So much so that it she had drowned in it. The new Myfanwy was determined not to make those same mistakes. She insisted on dedicating a few hours every day into developing interests outside of work. And, hey, if she stumbled upon a memory or two in the interim, that was a bonus.

The baking class was all inclusive and wasn’t separated by experience level. Myfanwy wrongfully assumed that meant she would find other absolute novices. Instead, she was surrounded by bakers that all seemed to know exactly what they were doing. 

“Hello, hello,” the instructor greeted with a wide smile. He had dark hair and dark eyes ornamenting a kind face. Myfanwy smiled back reservedly.

“Hi.”

He looked down at her bowl of whisked sugar, butter, and eggs. “You’re a bit behind, hm?”

“Yeah, I’ve actually never done this before.” She looked down at the laminated page with the written instructions meant to accompany his verbal instructions. “Bit confused, I suppose.”

“Okay, no problem. What are you confused by?” 

“Oh... everything? I’ve actually never cooked anything before.” 

“Right. So, looks like you’ve got a good start. You just need to fold in the dry ingredients now.”

Myfanwy stared at him. “And... what does it mean to ‘fold it in?’ It’s not exactly laundry.”

The instructor laughed and Myfanwy gritted her teeth against her humiliation. “Sorry. You’re right about that. So, to fold it you add a bit at a time and with your spatula you’re going to draw a line through the batter and make a figure eight until it’s nice and blended together.”

Myfanwy followed his instructions and came away with something somewhat resembling his example. After that, the instructor came by after each class instruction to help her along. She burned the first few projects, but she was slowly improving. She managed a tart that was only slightly  more brown than intended and could have jumped for joy.

At work a few days later, Alex Gestalt knocked on her door before letting themselves in. “Hey, I was wondering.... Are you busy tonight?”

Myfanwy stretched her fingers and leaned back. “I have my baking class, but nothing after that.”

Alex shoved his hands in his jacket pockets and hunched up his shoulders. “Thought maybe we could...  dunno ... hang out?”

“After? The class usually lets out at eight.” 

Gestalt grinned at her. “Pick you up, then?”

Myfanwy nodded and watched them stroll away. She was admittedly a bit distracted during class wondering just what Gestalt might have in mind for them. They were making biscuits. Carolanne, an older, matronly woman who worked at the stand in front of her, had taken it upon herself to make Myfanwy the best baker of her generation. She appreciated the help and had actually found that she genuinely enjoyed baking once she understood it.

Her first batch were hard and nearly inedible. Her second batch, not so much. She came away with twenty-four almost perfect biscuits by the time class was called at a quarter to eight. Myfanwy always took a bit longer to cleanup. She was the last one out of the kitchen when she finally left at five after eight.

“Thought you might’ve changed your mind about getting together,” Eliza remarked when she saw her.

Myfanwy held up her takeaway container full of biscuits. “I made biscuits.”

Eliza raised her eyebrows. “Homemade biscuits?”

Myfanwy opened the container and held it out for her. Eliza picked out one of her biscuits and took a bite. Myfanwy held her breath. Gestalt chewed thoughtfully and smiled.

“How does someone lose all their memories and suddenly get better at everything?” Gestalt teased.

“Nothing sudden about it. You should’ve seen how terrible I was a few weeks ago.”

Eliza linked her arm through Myfanwy’s elbow and led her down the street to a waiting car. “Well, my birthday is in a few more weeks, maybe you can make me a homemade cake.”

“Maybe we should see how well I do next week. We’re making sponge cakes.” Myfanwy smiled at the idea of surprising Gestalt with a homemade birthday cake. She froze. “Your birthday is in a few weeks?”

Eliza nodded focusing on the road as she drove. “On the eighteenth.”

“I haven’t gotten you a present.” Myfanwy pressed her hand over her mouth. “Or do I need to get four? Four of the same thing? Like matching t-shirts? Or maybe one big thing?”

Eliza reached over and grabbed Myfanwy’s hand away from her face. She brought it to her lips and kissed the back of it. “Calm down,  Myf . You already gave me the best present you could’ve.”

Myfanwy scowled at the container on her lap. “An overbaked biscuit?”

Gestalt laughed. “No! You came back. You stayed. That’s the best thing you ever could have given me. I’d have been a wreck without you.”

Eliza pulled the car into their parking garage. Myfanwy waited until she turned off the engine before pulling her in to kiss her. Eliza tangled her hand in Myfanwy’s short hair and unclipped her belt buckle to crawl onto her lap. Myfanwy pushed Eliza back, panting heavily. “You’re getting matching t-shirts.”

Eliza giggled and leaned forward to kiss her again. “Upstairs?”

“Mm. As fast as we can.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not all of these are happening in winter. IDK if that was a requirement, but I'm just flipping through the calendar and fitting these prompts in wherever.


	8. Slippery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy gets hurt.

Myfanwy let out a whimper of pain and Gestalt had to refrain from punching the doctor. She as a small woman. Teddy’s fist was probably bigger than her head. And if they punched  her they’d face disciplinary and Myfanwy would be without medical treatment. Every small moan and groan from Myfanwy made it harder to keep that in mind.

“Rook Gestalt, you should wait outside,” the doctor declared as if she could read their minds.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Gestalt!” Myfanwy barked. “Go away.”

Gestalt let out a huff and reluctantly stomped out of the exam room. It wasn’t their fault she was hurt. Myfanwy needed to watch where she was walking. She was trying to blame ice, but Gestalt had walked the exact same path she had and they hadn’t come across any ice.

It was over three hours of waiting before Myfanwy was checked out. She had a clunky cast around her hand that went halfway up her forearm. She walked with a slight limp. Gestalt reached for her wanting to help. Myfanwy shoved their hands away and kept walking up to her office. 

“C’mon,  Myf , you’re not blaming me.”

Myfanwy glared at them. “You think I tripped myself.”

Gestalt groaned. “There wasn’t any ice there, Myfanwy!”

“There  _ was _ !” She snapped. She sat down gingerly in her chair and grimaced before shifting to put her weight on her right side. She pulled out the first form in the stack Ingrid had left on her desk and started to review the file. After a moment she looked up at them again. “Don’t you have work to do?”

Gestalt sighed and left. They’d be at odds at least until Myfanwy’s injuries were healed. She could be so damn petty sometimes. It wasn’t like they were teasing her about having tripped herself. They set to work, but kept finding themselves outside her office checking in. A few times she caught them. Twice she flipped them off. 

It was a routine on Fridays that they gather at Myfanwy’s place and eat takeaway and listened to records or watch a movie. A tradition they had begun their first month at the  Checquy together. A small reprieve from the agency that owned their whole lives. Even when she was pissed, she always let them up. Usually, everything was forgiven before the food was gone.

Gestalt stopped at the front desk in her lobby. The man at the front desk was long used to their routine and waved them through. Gestalt knocked at her door and waited for her to answer. After a minute, they knocked again. 

“Go away!” Myfanwy yelled through the door.

Gestalt sighed and shut their eyes. “Myfanwy, it’s Friday. Don’t break tradition over nothing.”

“Just leave me alone!”

“Alright, you say there was ice, then there was ice. Is that what you want to hear?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t believe you right away.”

Myfanwy cracked the door open and stared out at them. “I just don’t want company right now.”

Gestalt put four hands on her door to keep her from shutting it again. “We always hang out Friday nights.”

Myfanwy shut her eyes. “I know. I just... not today.”

They clenched their teeth together. She was so  _ frustrating _ . “Why?”

Myfanwy huffed. “I... I don’t feel well.”

“All the more reason to let me in. Let me help.”

“No, I – I can take care of myself. I don’t want to trouble you. Besides, I’m not even dressed.” She made to close the door again. Gestalt glanced down to see she was still wearing the sweater she’d been wearing at work.

“You said you weren’t feeling well. Let me help. I have four able bodies and about thirty pounds of Thai food.” They pushed their way in and Myfanwy stumbled back helplessly.

They set the bags of food down on her counter and turned to look at her. They blushed on all four faces. She hadn’t been lying about not being dressed. She wasn’t wearing pants. Myfanwy scurried to her bedroom and shut her door, but not fast enough to keep Gestalt from seeing the monstrous bruise that fell down from her left buttock to the back of her knee.

“I told you I wasn’t dressed!” She accused through her bedroom door. “What’d you have to be such a shit for?”

“I thought you were just making an excuse!” Gestalt argued.

“So, you thought I was making it up again! Just like when I slipped on the ice!” She threw her door back open and came out to confront them wearing a pair of black leggings beneath her sweater.

“I said I was sorry about that.”

Myfanwy crossed her arms. The cast on her left wrist made it a bit awkward. “And then you immediately did it again.”

“Yeah, alright. But....”

“Are you alright?” They asked with all four voices.

Myfanwy shrugged. “My ass hurts more than my wrist so I’d say no, but there’s nothing to be done about it.”

“You could’ve said....”

Myfanwy glared at them. “I was humiliated enough.”

Gestalt held up eight empty hands. “I wasn’t judging you.”

“Liar.”

“I wasn’t!”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes and went to sit on her couch, curled onto her right side and cramming a throw pillow between her thighs. Gestalt helped themselves to the Thai food and fixed her a plate while they were at it. Robert brought it to her with an apologetic half smile. Myfanwy stared at them a second longer before taking the plate of food.

“Thank you.”

“Anytime.”

By the time they left around midnight, their usual rapport had been mostly restored. First thing on Monday morning, they sent Robert to her favorite coffee shop. She was by her car by the time they pulled into her building’s parking garage. They handed her a latte with a shot of espresso and offered to drive her into work. They couldn’t imagine it was entirely comfortable driving a car with her bruise. It must have been extremely painful because she agreed to the ride without any argument.

Three of their bodies headed straight into the office. They’d went out and gotten her a hemorrhoid pillow to try and make it easier to sit all day. Ingrid had arched an eyebrow, but kept her thoughts, mercifully, to herself. They wanted to do whatever they could to put a smile back on Myfanwy’s face. 

They were walking into the building together when Robert’s foot went out from under them and they landed flat on their back. Myfanwy stared down at them with a shit-eating grin on her face.

“See? Told you it was slippery.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And like that I have caught up on Fluffcember. One a day from now on praying I don't get behind at any time.


	9. Decorations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy and Gestalt do something nice for Ingrid.

“Why are we doing this?” Gestalt whined.

Myfanwy stretched up to hook the strand of lights over the temporary plastic hook stuck on the glass above Ingrid’s office door. She sighed and looked over at Teddy who was untangling another spool of lights by her desk. It was after eight and most of the office had gone home. Myfanwy climbed down from her perch on a fold out chair and moved it over to set up the next hook.

“We’re doing this because it’s Christmas and Ingrid  has always done her best for us.” Myfanwy climbed back up on the chair and held her hand out for the plastic hook. Robert pulled one out of the pack and placed it in her hand.

“We didn’t do this last year.” 

“Or the year before.”

“Her job performance is roughly the same.”

Myfanwy looped the lights into the hook and moved her chair again. She turned to glare at Gestalt with her hands on her hips before climbing back up again. “Yeah, well, last year Ingrid went home for Christmas and the year before and the year before and every other year until now. Remember?”

Gestalt frowned. Eliza paused in her taping garland around Ingrid’s desk. “It’s not like that’s strange around here. Neither of us have even seen our families since Glengrove.”

“Including on the holidays.”

Myfanwy huffed in frustration. “Just  _ once  _ can you do something normal? Like cheer up a friend who can’t see her family for the holidays?”

Gestalt was quiet as they went back to their assigned duties. Myfanwy set back to hanging the lights around the top of Ingrid’s office. She’d had dig the strands of lights out of storage from a bygone age of the office personnel decorating the Christmas parties. Most of the other decorations had been thrown out shortly after the  Checquy began renting Christmas decorations and hiring professionals to arrange them in more elaborate venues. One of two flagrant parties the  Checquy had every year, though their Christmas party had shifted into a New Year’s one.

“Is this because her dad died?” Gestalt blurted.

“Because we didn’t do anything then.”

“And that was all the way back in May.”

Myfanwy scowled at them, relieved she’d made the decision to do this during some of the few hours Ingrid wasn’t in the office. “ _ You _ didn’t do anything for her then, you selfish shit. Refused to even go to the funeral because it was ‘all the way’ in Cardiff and you were tired from an op in Belgium.”

“Well, it’s not like I knew the man.” 

“No, but you know Ingrid.”

Gestalt was quiet again. This time they stayed quiet, working diligently until the office looked like the North Pole had exploded within it. Myfanwy stood back to admire their handiwork. Myfanwy was a regular miser just like Gestalt was, but even she had to admit it looked lovely.

They packed away the rubbish and the leftover decorations that just wouldn’t fit and went home for the night. Myfanwy went into work three hours early just to beat Ingrid in. She wanted to see her reaction to it all. While she waited, she worked. No sense mucking about and getting nothing done she always figured.

At a quarter after five, Ingrid wheeled down the hall towards her illuminated office. She paused when she got close and scrunched her face up at the unfamiliar glow coming from her workspace. Myfanwy watched gleefully as Ingrid rolled slowly forward and saw her newly decorated office for the first time. Her lips parted and her eyes widened as she took it all in. Myfanwy smiled when Ingrid did. Pleased with herself.

Then, Ingrid burst into tears. Myfanwy’s heart sank and she leapt out of her seat to go to her.

“Ingrid....”

Her head snapped up and over to Myfanwy in surprise. “Oh, Myfanwy. What’re you doing here so early?”

Myfanwy grimaced and tucked her hair behind her ear. “I’m so sorry. I know you always spent the holidays with your dad and you’ve been so sad and I just wanted to help....”

Ingrid looked around her office. “This was you?”

Myfanwy tipped her head. “Well, and Gestalt though they were anything but willing. Maybe I should’ve listened....”

Ingrid shook her head and fixed her with a watery smile. “No, I love it. Really, I do. It’s lovely.”

Myfanwy’s face scrunched up. “Then, why are you crying?”

Ingrid gave a wry laugh and dabbed at the tears under her eyes. “I just started thinking, you know?” She smiled and toyed with the garland around her desk. “My dad really would’ve loved this.”

Myfanwy took a step forward and leaned down to give Ingrid a hug. Ingrid patted Myfanwy’s back and sniffled in her ear.

“Thank you, Myfanwy. Really.” 

Myfanwy stepped back.

“Thank you.”

“Merry Christmas, Ingrid.”

Gestalt came in at the usual time. One body, Eliza’s, headed straight for Myfanwy’s office. She glanced over at Ingrid who was on the phone and staring at the lazily blinking lights above her door.

“Not a total waste of time, hey?”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes at them. “Maybe you could try being a bit kinder to her? Maybe think of someone other than yourself? She does half your job for you anyway.”

Eliza narrowed her eyes at her. “Does not.” They pressed their lips together and reached inside their coat after something. “But... I thought since your offices are beside each other, you could use some decoration of your own.” Gestalt set down a Rudolph plushie on her desk and squeezed the paw to make its nose blink.  _ Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer’ _ s tune played out.

Myfanwy blushed and pinched its fleece ear between her fingers. She understood completely the tears she’d seen on Ingrid that morning. Myfanwy almost felt like crying herself. Her heart felt full. There was no way Gestalt just had a Rudolph plushie hanging around their apartment which meant sometime between leaving last night and coming into work this morning, Gestalt had stopped off and specifically chose a decoration with her in mind. And she’d just accused them of being selfish and thoughtless.

“Thank you.”

“Merry Christmas,  Myf .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went sappy. 'Tis the season.


	10. Below Zero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea what this is.

“Fuck’s sake! It’s minus twenty out here!” Myfanwy rubbed her gloved hands up and down her arms.

Gestalt checked the weather app on their phone and sighed. “It’s only minus two, Myfanwy. Not exactly Antarctica.”

Myfanwy scowled at them and stomped further into the row of trees. Gestalt wondered how they’d been roped into tree shopping in the first place. Myfanwy had volunteered when Linda had brought it up. Eager beaver that she was. The next few seconds of the meeting were a bit of a blur, but it all ended with Gestalt being ordered to accompany Myfanwy on her (in their opinion) pointless excursion.

“Teddy!” Myfanwy shouted. She’d gotten away from them again. They hurried down the row of trees hunting for her. She was standing towards the end beside a salesman staring at an absurdly large tree. Gestalt jogged over to her, shooting a warning look at the salesman who was panting after Myfanwy like a dog staring at a bone.

“Too big.”

Myfanwy glowered at them. “It’s going in the middle of a room with fifteen feet ceilings. It’s small in that context.”

Gestalt rolled their eyes. “How’re we  s’posed to get it there? And what are we  s’posed to do with it afterwards?”

Myfanwy waved her gloved hand at them. “Details.”

“ _ Important _ details.”

“Minor.”

Gestalt opened their mouth to argue again and changed their mind. They pulled their phone out again and snapped a picture of the tree. They attached it to a message and sent it. “We’ll just see what Farrier has to say about it, hm?”

Myfanwy narrowed her eyes at them and crossed her arms, turning her eyes back to the oversized fir. “Tattletale,” she mumbled.

“How much would it be for a tree like this?” Gestalt asked the salesman who was lingering. He jumped when he realized Gestalt was talking to him again.

“Oh, um, it’s twelve and a half feet and it’s a fir which is a more expensive tree to begin with so you’d be looking at about a hundred to a hundred and fifty.”

“ _ A hundred and fifty _ ?” Gestalt repeated incredulously.

Myfanwy slapped their arm. “Be nice.”

Farrier stopped at their office and looked in on Robert and Eliza. “Tree looks good. Have them send it straight to the venue.”

Gestalt’s mouths fell open. “It’s a hundred and fifty pounds!”

Linda shrugged. “Alright, well, have Myfanwy draw up the expense report when she gets back.”

Myfanwy tilted her head up at them. “What happened?”

Gestalt gritted their teeth. “Farrier said to get it.”

Myfanwy’s eyes lit up triumphantly. “Ha!” She turned to the salesman. “Wrap it up. You have a delivery service, I trust?”

The man nodded. “For an additional fee.”

Myfanwy nodded. “I need it sent to this address.” She handed them a card with the venue’s address on it.

The salesman nodded and scanned the barcode on the tree’s tag before stick a ‘sold’ tag on the monstrosity. Gestalt followed them to the till and waited for Myfanwy to pay the man. She turned to them with a huge grin on her face. Gestalt found it hard to keep up their miserly attitude when she beamed at them like that.

Myfanwy linked her arm through theirs as they walked back to the parking garage that they were forced to park in given how busy the streets were. She gave a violent shake, jostling their arm. They looked down at her.

“Alright?”

“Cold.”

Gestalt slipped their arm out of hers and pulled off their coat to drape it over her shoulders. She swam in it adorably. She stared up at them. Her face was red from the cold.

“You’ll freeze. It’s a hundred degrees below zero.” 

Gestalt rolled their eyes and kept walking towards the garage. “It’s minus 2. I’ll be fine.” They glanced down at her again. “More meat on my bones, besides.

Myfanwy tugged their coat shut around her and buried her cold face in it. She was quiet for a while as they walked. Her eyes were sort of distant. They wondered what she was thinking. She was so energetic just minutes before.

“Something wrong?”

Myfanwy shook her head as they reached the Jeep. 

Gestalt opened the door for her and she sat down. Gestalt turned the heat on full blast for her. Myfanwy sighed and dropped their coat from around her shoulders. 

“You smell good, you know.”

Gestalt was glad they hadn’t started driving anywhere. They felt four hearts stop. Myfanwy pulled her gloves off and stuck her bare hands directly on the vents.

“Thanks?” 

Myfanwy gave them a coy smile and rolled her eyes. “Your coat smells like your cologne, I mean.”

Gestalt nodded in understanding. Their faces were red. They wished they were still out in the frigid winter air so they could blame it on something other than their embarrassment. 

“Eliza smells the best, if I’m being honest. Though, I suppose that’s not really a surprise.” Gestalt stuck the car in reverse and pulled out of the parking spot. They needed to be out of the stifling embarrassment of this conversation and the quickest way to do that was to get back to the Checquy.

“I’ve been trying to find a perfume that smells as good as yours.” 

“What?”

Myfanwy played with the sleeve of their coat in her lap. “Nothing.”

Gestalt cleared their throat. “I... I liked the rose perfume you had a while back.”

Myfanwy brightened again, smiling at them. “Yeah?”

Gestalt nodded and watched her pick up their coat collar around her shoulders to breathe in their cologne again. God, they loved her.

A week later, they were all gathered at the office Christmas party. The tree was still massive even in the  fifteen foot ceiling, but all decorated, Gestalt had to admit it was beautiful. Myfanwy danced with them and Gestalt was pleased to note that she was wearing the rose perfume again.

“You want to get some air?” They asked as the night waned on.

Myfanwy looked out the windows on the French doors. “It’s ten below.”

Gestalt chuckled. “You can wear my coat.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know. Honestly. One thing just bled into another and then... this. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


	11. Pine Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy is incompetent. Gestalt to the rescue.

Wilderness survival was the single worst thing  Glengrove would ever foist upon her. Especially wilderness training when it was still cold enough that she could still see her breath. They were in teams of four. She was with a girl that could breathe underwater named Paige Hart, a boy that could withstand extreme temperatures both hot and cold named Nathan Wisseau, and Alex Gestalt. The other Gestalt siblings had all been split up between four groups, though Myfanwy couldn't remember which.

“Okay, first thing first. We need a fire,” Paige declared. 

“Speak for yourself,” Nathan dropped his pack onto the frozen ground and plopped on top of it, stretching his arms up over his head and shutting his eyes.

“We need sticks, preferably dry ones, but it’s been raining a lot lately,” Paige went on.

“I’ll go get some,” Myfanwy volunteered. Anything was better than sitting around waiting to freeze to death. What she wouldn’t give to have Nathan’s powers for a night.

There was scrambling behind her as she walked and then Nathan was at her side. “Hey, I’ll go with you. No telling what’s out in these woods.”

Myfanwy raised her eyebrow at him. “And so now I have to protect you as well as myself?”

Nathan twisted his mouth up and kicked at a fallen tree trunk that had half rotted back into the earth. “I could protect you. From... bears.”

“Bears?” Myfanwy shook her head and started looking for sticks and maybe she’d get lucky and find some dry leaves they could use to light it. “Maybe we should just take a few of these low branches. They’ve been kept off the ground at least. Probably drier than what’s on the ground.”

Nathan nodded and pulled out his hatchet to start hacking at the branches. Myfanwy picked some of them up and started back towards their campsite. Alex and Paige had set up their tents already and had a space cleared for their fire. Alex looked over at her when she came back. His eyes dropped to the tree branch in her hands.

“Where’d you get that?”

Myfanwy jerked her head behind her. “Full of trees, yeah?”

Alex shook his head. “No, I mean, did you get it off the ground?”

“Well, the stuff on the ground is all wet and muddy so we just cut a few branches from a tree back there to use.” 

Alex and Paige sighed heavily. Myfanwy gritted her teeth. She hated it enough when it was just the Gestalts treating her like an imbecile, she definitely didn’t need  _ Paige _ teaming up with them.

“Live trees have a constant flow of water in them from the soil. The sticks on the ground might be wet on the outside, but they’re more likely to catch fire than fresh branches,” Alex explained.

“Did you pay  _ any _ attention in foraging?” Paige demanded, hands on her hips.

Myfanwy chucked her branches to the side angrily before frowning at the way they’d stuck to her hands. She looked down to see her hands covered in the little needle-like leaves and something sticky. She let out a cry of disgust.

“ Ew ! What is this?” She shook her hands trying to get it off. Alex grabbed her wrists and looked at her palms.

“It’s pine sap. From the pine tree. It’s exactly what I just told you about.”

Myfanwy pulled her wrists away. “Well, I’m washing it off.” She started for her water flask. Alex grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back.

“You’re going to waste our only drinking water to wash your hands?” Paige demanded before Alex even opened his mouth.

Myfanwy scowled at her and then at her hands. She frowned at them as she remembered the way her EVA burned in her palms and turned the dirt and oils on them black. If she had any control over her power, she’d use it right then to rid herself of the slime. 

Alex sighed again and grabbed her elbow to drag her deeper into the woods. “Come on.”

“Where are we going?” Myfanwy asked as they tramped through the still bare trees. “Are you voting me off the island now?”

Alex glanced back at her over his shoulder. “What? We’re not on an island. Entirely different tactical and survival constraints.”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes. “Would it kill you to watch a little T.V.?” She mumbled.

Alex stopped her at a small creek about twenty minutes from the camp. “Wash your hands here.”

How he knew about the creek or was able to find it so fast, she’d never know. Still, she wasn’t  about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Myfanwy dropped to her knees and dunked her hands into the water before yelping at how cold it was. She scrubbed her hands against the rocks at the bottom to relieve herself of the sticky pine sap. She stood back up and shook the water from her hands before wiping them on her pants.

“Happy?” Alex asked.

Myfanwy grabbed his shoulder and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Delighted.” She started back for the campsite again stopping a few yards away when she realized Alex was still standing by the creek. “Hey!”

Alex turned slowly to look at her. His face was a slightly brighter pink than before. She figured from the cold. Myfanwy cocked her head back towards the campsite.

“Are you coming?”

Alex ducked his head and scrubbed his hand through his hair before jogging up to her and leading the way back to camp. He stopped them a few yards out and helped her collect a pile of sticks that would be more useful for starting their campfire. Myfanwy watched him curiously. He was a bit more flustered than usual. She wondered if he was just that cold. She wished again that Nathan could share his EVA. There’d be no need for a campfire or a pine sap mishap in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They're just babies. Neither of them have any idea how to deal with emotions.  
> Oh... wait.... They still don't know how to do that as adults.... Oh, well! Thanks for reading!


	12. Holiday Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gestalt tries to boost Myfanwy's morale.

Gestalt had nightmares that had them waking up coughing so hard their eyes would water as if they were still choking on the smoke. They would shake and cough and scramble out of their beds until they could make sense of their new surroundings. Not a building on fire. Their flat. In downtown London. A small, closet of a space that barely fit one of their bodies, let alone four. 

Three months before, they’d been offered four separate flats spread across London. One for each body. Worse than separate rooms in Glengrove. Worse than one body being on the opposite end of a large building. Miles away from themselves. They’d objected adamantly and the tiny, one bedroom flat became their new home. 

It wouldn’t last. They only needed to put in the hours and effort to get the promotion they knew they deserved. They’d find a better apartment. In a nicer neighborhood. They scowled at the drizzle of water that came down from their shower. 

_With better accommodations._

They filled four gym bags with spare clothes and headed into the Checquy to shower in the locker rooms before reporting in. It was more crowded on the streets than usual. They divided their bodies. Each one left five minutes after the one before and took four different routes into work on the trains. Inconspicuous and further practice in compartmentalization. 

It was Eliza that noted the decorations. The other bodies quickly made further note. It was Christmastime. They’d forgotten all about it. After everything else that had happened in the past few months, holidays seemed arbitrary. 

They hadn’t seen Myfanwy in three weeks. It had been a fight to get to see her in the first place. She was holed up in Farrier’s remote cabin far away from civilization. The King insisted it wasn’t a punishment, but it very obviously was. They just couldn’t believe the pedophile that had preyed on her hadn’t been strung up by his entrails and exposed for the cretin that he was. 

At the end of the day, Gestalt went up to the King’s office. She was still there. Not unusual for her or any of the higher ranking operatives. Gestalt waited until she finished her phone call. A display of self-control given how desperate they were to get it over with. 

“What is it, Gestalt?” Farrier began straightening paperwork into a briefcase. 

“I’d like to see Myfanwy this weekend.” 

Farrier sighed and paused in her efforts without looking at them. “I don’t believe she’s up to visitors at the moment.” 

Gestalt gritted their teeth and clenched fists that weren’t in Farrier’s office. “Please. I... It’s Christmas. She loves Christmas. Maybe I could-" 

“Gestalt.” Farrier looked up at them with a hard eye. “I said no.” 

They wanted to argue further. They wanted to tell her to stick it up her ass. Instead, they pressed their lips together, murmured an apology, and backed out of her office. They waited a week before trying again for the same answer. They remembered how despondent Myfanwy was the last time they’d seen her. Lifeless. Haunted. Their nightmares were tame compared to what she dealt with. 

“Myfanwy would do anything to cheer you up if it was the other way around.” 

“The superiors like Myfanwy better than you, though.” 

_She wouldn’t run into these sorts of problems._

_Even if she did...._

_“_ If she did, she wouldn’t let it stop her.” 

“She’d do something reckless and stupid and she wouldn’t stop until you were properly cheered.” 

Gestalt made up their mind. They divided themselves the next night. Two to the stores where they bought every strand of Christmas lights they could find. One to a nearby pizzeria to get Myfanwy’s favorite pizza. And one to the Checquy’s vehicle depot. They were reviewing the proper techniques for hotwiring a car in their heads as they walked, careful to avoid the cameras. 

_Or, you could just take a set of keys...._

Their eyes fell upon the wall of car keys. They grabbed a set for a Jeep and ducked through the rows of vehicles hunting for the matching license plate that was conveniently tagged on the keys. They unlocked the car and got in the driver’s seat. They’d taken tactical driving lessons in Glengrove, but hadn’t touched a car in over a year. 

They pulled out of the garage, stopping at the gate and jumping out just long enough to reach through the window and slam the gate release button in the empty guard box. They knew the guard shifts. Matthew, a retainer, took twenty minute bathroom breaks every day at the same time. 

Gestalt stopped to pick up their other bodies before driving out of London towards Farrier’s private cabin. They’d been there twice, but they remembered the way. They pulled into the driveway and shut off the lights. The house was dark. Gestalt set to work with three bodies while the fourth investigated. 

They found Myfanwy in the back bedroom. Her back was to the window so they couldn’t tell if she was sleeping or not. She was there. That was the important thing. They hurried through the rest of their preparations. It was time consuming and freezing and it made them feel like a complete idiot, but they would do just about anything if it meant seeing Myfanwy smile again. 

They wired the lights into the cabin and stood back. They may have gone a bit overboard. The lights were so strong it could almost trick someone into thinking it was daytime. They sucked up their nerves and knocked on the door. There was no answer. They knocked again. They sent one body around to the back window where Myfanwy was unmoved in her bed. 

Gestalt knocked at her window. She stirred, but didn’t turn around right away. They knocked again. She finally turned and sat up to look at them. Her eyes were puffy and rimmed with red just the same as the last few times they’d seen her. They grinned at her and pointed towards the front of the house. Her brows drew together, but she got out of bed and started for the front of the house. They raced back around to meet her. 

“Gesta....” Her mouth fell open as she looked around at the lights in the yard wrapped around every tree and looping across the grass. 

“Happy Christmas, Myfanwy!” They said as one. 

Robert held out a wrapped gift and Teddy held up the pizza. Myfanwy’s eyes filled and she let out a sob. Gestalt’s smiles fell like their hearts. They’d thought this would cheer her up. They’d been so convinced. So _stupid_! 

“Myfanwy, I’m sorry. I thought this-" 

Myfanwy knocked the wind out of Eliza’s body as she slammed herself into them. Her arms were iron tight around them, her face buried in their shoulder. Gestalt slowly returned the hug. Ready at any moment for this to turn into some sneak attack. Some revenge. It didn’t. 

After a few long minutes locked in that embrace, Myfanwy pulled back and looked over at the box in Teddy’s hands. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and smiled for the first time in months. 

“Please tell me that has mushrooms.” 

Gestalt laughed. “As if I’d forget.” 

They sat down on the porch and stared at the lights as they ate. Myfanwy finally worked herself into opening up the small present they’d gotten her. A small, golden bracelet. She ran her finger across the metal, gleaming in the overdone lights. 

“Does it make me a monster to say I’m relieved you weren’t lost in the fire, too?” Myfanwy murmured as she stared at the bracelet. 

Gestalt frowned. “Of course not.” 

Myfanwy sniffled and shook her head. “So many other people died, though. And when I found out you were safe all I could think was, ‘That’s good.’ I was okay with anyone else dying. Just not you. And... and I killed them.” 

It was hard not to jump for joy at hearing how Myfanwy cared for them. Gestalt wrapped four arms around her and squeezed. “It was an accident. A freak accident and there was no way you could have known that would happen.” 

Myfanwy sniffled again and sighed. “Alright, tell me something about you now. How’s it working at the Checquy? Did they make you a senior officer yet? Don’t tell me you’ve already been promoted to King and are now in charge of the whole operation.” 

Gestalt laughed. “None of that, actually.” 

“I fetch coffee, I make copies, I say yes ma’am and no sir, and I go home to a shit apartment in the shitty end of town. You’re living at the height of luxury here. An entire waitstaff to cater to your every need.” 

Myfanwy gave a wry laugh, wet with her withheld tears. “Yeah, well, I’d be there with you if Farrier weren’t convinced I’m ‘not quite ready for the pressure’ which is just her way of saying she thinks I’m too dangerous to be around other people.” 

Headlights turned into the driveway and Gestalt’s stomachs dropped. The car stopped just before the lights began. The driver got out and slammed the door. Gestalt jumped to their feet and braced for the verbal lashing they knew was coming. Myfanwy slowly got to her feet between them. 

“Thank you,” Myfanwy said before anyone else could say a word. 

Farrier frowned at her in confusion. “What for?” 

Myfanwy let a small smile flit across her face as she gestured to the lights. “I assumed this was your doing.” 

_She’s lying._

_She knows Farrier had nothing to do with this._

Farrier paused and looked around at the lights. Myfanwy smiled wider. “I needed something to remind me of the good things that are out there.” 

Farrier pursed her lips, but didn’t say anything to contradict her. Her eyes finally turned away from Myfanwy to Gestalt. Their bodies locked up with nerves. She let out a burdensome sigh. “I’m afraid Gestalt is going to need to come back to the office now, however. Something’s come up.” Farrier turned back for her car. “Say your goodbyes quickly.” 

Myfanwy hugged each of their bodies in turn whispering thank you over and over again. She pressed a kiss to Eliza’s cheek and stood back to watch them walk back to the Jeep. Farrier waved three of their bodies into her car and instructed the fourth to return the Jeep to the vehicle depot. 

It was quiet for a long time on the ride back. At long last, Farrier spoke. “Janitorial duties for a week.” 

Gestalt frowned in the Jeep, but kept the faces with Farrier neutral. 

“And this is never spoken of again.” 

They nodded, mutely. 

“And if you _ever_ disobey a direct order from me again, you will be remanded to the archives where you will spend the rest of your days out of the way and out of the loop. I know you hope to earn a promotion to Rook or even Chevalier in the future. One more stunt like this and you will forfeit any opportunities that might be afforded to you. Do I make myself clear?” 

“Yes, ma’am,” they said in three voices. 

Farrier was quiet a while longer. “Fill out the proper vehicle request forms next time.” 

Gestalt sat mute while they worked through what she said. “Sorry, ma’am, but does that mean I’m... we’re allowed to visit Myfanwy again?” 

Farrier’s grip shifted on the steering wheel. “Doesn’t seem to do any use telling you to stay away.” 

Gestalt grinned like a fool in the Jeep. They’d been prepared for immediate dismissal. A week in the Box. Relocation to the most unsavory branch of the Checquy. Instead, they were hardly punished and received barely more than a slap on the wrist. Along with permission to see Myfanwy whenever they wished in the future. Such was the power of Myfanwy. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Doing a lot of old Myfanwy and Gestalt in these prompts... they just seem to work out better.


	13. Mistletoe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Baby Mystalt's first Checquy Christmas party.

Myfanwy stared at herself in her bedroom mirror. She’d gone a bit less drab in the cut of her dress. The waist was tapered and adorned with a red, silk ribbon the came to a bow on her left hip. The rest of the dress was dark grey velvet. The skirt went to just below her knees. She let out a heavy sigh. It wasn’t the worst thing she’d worn. 

The party was already in full swing by the time she walked in the door. Her first party as a Checquy agent. Pawn. She picked up a glass of champagne and stared at it in her hand. Her first glass of champagne... ever. Before Glengrove, she’d filched her parents’ alcohol or gotten some of the older kids to buy it. Always the hard stuff. Whiskey, tequila, rum, vodka. Never champagne. 

“Ah, Tiffany, you made it!” A rook greeted. He was a firestarter and her direct superior. She worked with him every day. And the bastard still didn’t know her name. 

She fixed him with a tight smile and immediately started looking for her exit. His hand settled on her upper arm. Every nerve in her body went on high alert. He smiled at her. All teeth. 

“You’re always so dreary in the office, but you really clean up.” 

Myfanwy was weighing her options. Jerk her arm away and run for the exit was option one. Option two was to shove her fist into his teeth as hard as she could. Option three.... Option three was not an option. Never again. 

“Found you!” Eliza squealed a bit more enthusiastically than strictly necessary. 

Myfanwy smiled at them and turned away from the rook. Alex looked at the man, straightening up to his full height, but keeping his demeanor outwardly friendly. 

“Rook Manson, right?” 

He nodded. “And you’re... sorry, I don’t really remember the names of all the juniors. So many of you in and out, know what I mean?” 

“No,” Eliza and Alex said together. 

Manson cleared his throat and patted Myfanwy’s arm before walking away to try his luck somewhere else. Myfanwy kept herself facing Eliza and shut her eyes. She had already had reserves about coming to the event in the first place. She was the newest pawn in the agency and the gossip mill had been turning around her well before she’d gotten there. 

“Champagne? Thought you liked the rough stuff?” Alex bemoaned her. 

Myfanwy looked at the still full glass in her hand and blew a breath out through her nose. “Never had champagne before, actually.” 

Gestalt’s eyebrows went up. “There’s something Miss Worldwide hasn’t had?” 

Myfanwy rolled her eyes at them and took a sip, maintaining eye contact with Alex as she did. She drained the flute and smiled at them. “Not anymore.” 

Eliza took her elbow and steered her towards a bar set up at the back of the ballroom. “Let’s get you something more your style, shall we?” 

Teddy and Robert were waiting for them when they got there. Teddy handed her a shot glass. Five glasses clinked together before being tossed back into five mouths. Myfanwy reveled in the deep burn that moved down to settle in her gut. 

“You know, I almost didn’t come.” 

Gestalt ordered another round of drinks and an additional cocktail for Myfanwy to drink. “I know.” 

“You get enough of the gossip in the office.” 

“Tell you a secret?” Teddy whispered in her ear. 

Myfanwy sipped her drink. “Always.” 

Gestalt was pensive. “ _Show_ you a secret?” Alex asked. 

Myfanwy rolled her eyes at their dramatics. “Always.” 

“Is she meant to be drinking?” A woman down the bar hissed to another. “Won’t that... I dunno, set her off?” 

Myfanwy swallowed and fought off the urge to bolt. She leaned on the bar and ordered two more shots for herself. She downed them both and turned to Gestalt. 

“Right.” She stumbled and latched onto Robert’s arm to keep herself steady. “Show me your secret.” 

Gestalt lead her towards an exit that led into a hallway. Myfanwy was hoping that meant they were planning to leave. She could do for an escape. 

“Rob!” Another man called. She felt the muscles in Gestalt’s body tense up, but he stopped in the doorway and turned to acknowledge the man. “Hey, I saw that report you finished up. Great job, man.” 

“Thanks.” 

The man patted Robert on the shoulder. His hand lingered. Myfanwy looked between Robert and the coworker. Myfanwy pressed her lips together. Robert looked like he wanted to burn the man’s hand off for touching him, but the man didn’t notice or didn’t care. 

“Uh-oh!” A woman cried. “Someone’s under the mistletoe!” She sang loudly. Suddenly, everyone within ten feet of them was chanting. 

“Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!” 

Myfanwy looked up in the doorway. Sure enough, there was mistletoe hanging about them. Gestalt noticed it at the same time. She didn’t think she’d ever seen their four faces such a bright red. They’d kissed people before. She knew. It wasn’t kissing that embarrassed them. It was the publicity. 

Myfanwy didn’t know why, but she reached up and turned Robert’s face toward hers to kiss them. A quick peck. The crowd was satisfied enough to disperse. Myfanwy grinned at them. They were an even brighter red now. Or she was just really drunk. 

“Secret time?” She insisted, remembering why they were in that doorway in the first place. 

Gestalt took an extra two seconds to recalibrate before guiding them out of the ballroom and down the hallway. It was a small alcove completely away from the rest of the partygoers. Away from the gossip and the rumors and he unsavoriness of it all. 

Myfanwy dropped onto the couch and pulled up her legs. She pulled Robert down with her and waited for the other bodies to follow suit. Myfanwy stared at them. The booze was starting to hit her hard. She ran her fingers through Robert’s long, soft hair. 

“Mm... sorry for kissing you like that. Don’t mean to make you uncomfortable.” 

Gestalt was quiet all around her. With four mouths, the silence was always pointed. She dropped her hand and leaned back. Robert grabbed her hand and cupped the back of her head with the other. Myfanwy didn’t move. Robert leaned forward and caught her bottom lip between his. A slower kiss than the peck she’d given him beneath the mistletoe. 

Myfanwy tilted her head and drew them in deeper. She felt the heat moving over and through her. The build that came only from a very specific type of intimacy. She felt herself being pressed back into the couch. And then it wasn’t Gestalt kissing her. It was Andrew. 

The smell of smoke flooded her nostrils and filled her lungs. She shoved Gestalt back hard. Too hard. She felt the distinct feel of her EVA sparking in her palms. They gave a cry and backed down immediately. Myfanwy got to her feet. The room spun. Eliza and Teddy got to their feet and Myfanwy waved them off. 

“No. No, sorry.” She realized her vision was blurred by more than the alcohol as the hot tear dropped down her cheeks. 

“I’m sorry. I....” 

“Won’t happen again,” they swore. 

Myfanwy shook her head. They thought she was mad at them. Stupid liquor was making it hard to make sense. Of anything. 

“We should go back to the party,” she suggested. She took a step and stumbled. “Maybe I should call a cab....” 

“I can take you home,” Alex offered. 

Myfanwy was already pulling her phone from her clutch. She looked Alex in the eye. He turned red and looked away. “I think we both know that’s a bad idea.” 

Eliza walked her to the front of the venue where her cab was waiting to take her home. She knew there was something more they wanted to say. She didn’t know what it was, but she knew she wasn’t ready to hear it. Myfanwy got in the cab quickly and rolled down the window. 

“I’ll see you Monday.” 

Eliza nodded. “Happy Christmas.” 

“Happy Christmas.” 

Myfanwy woke up with a wicked hangover and the vague impression that she should feel guilty of something. With no idea what it was, the feeling eventually went away. The one thing that didn’t was her sudden and unwavering appreciation for mistletoe. 


	14. Long Scarf

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> EXTRA long scarf.

It was hideous. It was garish. It was impressive.

Gestalt held one end at the door to the bedroom and the other at their front door. Their apartment was small, but it wasn’t that small. They started to wind it back up over their arms. It was at least five reams of yarn. Likely, it was more, but there were five colors alternating and then mixing together in a haphazard way that didn’t remotely resemble a pattern of any kind. Not to mention, she’d gone and picked the ugliest versions of each color that possibly existed.

One end started with pink. An awful fuchsia shade that may as well have been colored with a highlighter. It went immediately into a muddy red color. Almost brown like dried blood. That turned into an indigo so aggressive it would put an  aubergine to shame. The fourth was a blueish-grey like the sky in the middle of a drizzle. The other end stopped at black. It was the  width of Teddy’s hand from wrist to fingertips.

Myfanwy emerged from the bathroom just then. They stowed the scarf back on the counter and became very occupied with making dinner. Myfanwy sat on her barstool and picked up her wine glass. 

“You looked.” 

Gestalt tapped a wooden spoon against the side of the pot and made a ruckus getting the plates down from the cabinet. Myfanwy was unimpressed.

“You hate it.”

“No!” They lied poorly. 

_ You’re a top agent at a covert government facility. _

How _ are you this bad at lying? _

Myfanwy sipped her wine and smiled. “Yes, you do.”

“You made it yourself. How could I possibly hate something you made?”

Myfanwy laughed and went to retrieve the scarf. She unrolled it down the counter and folded it back over itself. Gestalt wrinkled a nose at the scarf. It was not pretty. It wasn’t even all the way down. There were several holes where she’d dropped stitches. Gestalt tried to remember to keep their faces neutral.

“Did you look in the other bag?” She picked up her purse and brought it over with her.

“Did you make another one?”

Myfanwy giggled. “No. I just made this. Whenever I felt... however... I would add a couple rows to this.”

Gestalt looked again at the length of the scarf. She must have felt... however... pretty often. They had no idea what that meant. If that meant she knitted when she felt angry or sad it was a bad sign. If her knitting was whenever she was thinking of them... well, that was flattering.

Myfanwy dipped her hand into her purse and pulled out a digital camera. She cleared her throat. “I admit that the length was unintentional, but once it was somewhere close to this, I had an idea.”

“An idea,” they repeated in all voices.

Myfanwy smiled at them and nodded. “A Christmas card idea.”

Gestalt stared at the scarf and then at the camera. “No.”

Myfanwy jutted out her bottom lip. “Please?”

Gestalt shook their heads firmly. “Absolutely not.”

Myfanwy hung her head. She let out a forlorn sigh. “Alright.”

Gestalt stared at her downturned head for a few seconds. The struggled hopelessly with their pride and their steadfast desire to give Myfanwy whatever she wanted. They groaned and turned off their stove.

“Alright.”

Myfanwy looked up, hope flickering in her baby blue eyes. “It’s fine, Gestalt, really. You don’t have to.”

“Stop.”

They waved their hands for the scarf. “Just... quickly. Before I have the chance to change my mind.”

Myfanwy scrambled out of her seat and set up the camera on the counter. She positioned them against their neutral living room wall and wrapped the scarf around Alex and Eliza’s necks. She stopped and went back to the camera before wrapping the scarf around her own neck and passing it to Teddy who wrapped it around their neck and then on to Robert. Myfanwy grabbed Alex and Teddy’s arms in hers and beamed at the camera. After another 2 seconds, the camera flashed.

Myfanwy slipped out of the scarf and ran over to inspect the picture. She giggled to herself before turning to show Gestalt. They had to admit, they looked cute. Especially Myfanwy. The scarf was still the ugliest thing that had ever been made, but Myfanwy was happy. A happiness that oozed out of the photograph and seeped into them.

Eliza kissed Myfanwy’s cheek. “You owe me.”

Myfanwy nodded, still staring at the camera. Alex wrapped his arm around her waist and slipped their fingers just under the hem of her shirt to skim along her belly. Myfanwy stilled. “I intend to collect.”

Dinner mostly forgotten, Gestalt pulled Myfanwy into the bedroom though they weren’t one hundred percent sure if they were the ones collecting or if Myfanwy was claiming yet another victory over them. Not that it mattered. They all got off anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have "ideas" or "thoughts" or "any clue what's going on". What I do have is a word processor and a platform on which to post whatever shit flies from my fingertips, which, as it stands, includes this.  
> Happy reading!


	15. Sick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone gets the flu.  
> Gestalt and Myfanwy are both still Pawns at this point.

“How are they?” Myfanwy asked the doctor in the infirmary.

“Three bodies have fevers, on the low side. They’re complaining of sore throats and vomiting. Overall, it’s nothing that can’t be cured with a regimen of cough syrup, hot tea, and rest.” The doctor handed her a piece of paper outlining care duties. “You can take them home as soon as you wish.”

Myfanwy shuffled them all into one of the  Checquy’s Jeeps. Still a tight fit with five adult bodies. Even with Eliza squashed in the middle seat. They slumped onto each other. Myfanwy drove them back to their flat. Small. Squat. But dutifully tidy.

“Go change. Put on bedclothes, I’ll put the kettle on.” She watched them trudge into their bedroom and noted the lack of distinction in their mannerisms. They all walked exactly the same. All moved and breathed and behaved as one. She’d never seen such a deconstruction of their compartmentalization before.

Once they were changed, she got them all into bed. A bed that took up three quarters of the bedroom with barely enough room to move around. Myfanwy took out the cough syrup she’d been supplied with and checked the dosage again on the doctor’s instructions. One tablespoon per body every six hours. Seemed doable. 

Gestalt sipped their tea and complained over sore throats in tandem. Myfanwy was beyond fascinated. If she’d ever  doubted they were all really one person, those doubts had dried. They leaned back against their pillows and went to sleep. Myfanwy took the chance to snoop.

They didn’t have much. It only made sense with a flat as small as theirs. They had to fit four bodies into the tight space daily. No sense clogging it with bobbles and trinkets. Not like Myfanwy. All alone in an apartment large enough to be a constant reminder of the King’s own guilt of  Glengrove . And a penance for Myfanwy. She would be reminded every day of what she did. The lives she took.

Myfanwy napped on the couch. She awoke to find Gestalt still sleeping so she decided to pop out and grab some food for them. Odds were, if she  cooked they’d wind up more sick than before.

“Who’s there?” Four voices croaked when she returned.

“It’s Myfanwy.” She set the bags down in the kitchen and continued into the bedroom. Gestalt was sitting up. A little of tissues were cast about the duvet. “You feel like eating?”

Gestalt tossed their covers back, flinging used tissues across the room. “I’ll cook,” they said, again in four voices.

“No, no, no you don’t. You’re sick. You’re staying in bed.” She pushed at Eliza and Robert to keep them from getting up and nodded for Teddy and Alex to do the same. “I bought some soup. Still warm. You feel like you can eat?”

Gestalt reclined against the pillows and nodded. Myfanwy brought in the soups and let them pick which to eat. Unsurprisingly, they all ate the same soup. Chicken and vegetable. Myfanwy made sure they all took their next dose of cough syrup before letting them go back to sleep. 

Myfanwy cleaned up the dishes and the bedroom before sitting down to field e-mails on her work laptop. She’d been given permission from Linda herself to take care of Gestalt, but not everybody got the memo. Low on the totem pole as she may have been, nobody seemed to be able to go a day without her. An hour or two after they’d eaten, Myfanwy heard a clatter come from their bedroom followed by a trampling of feet. She jumped up to see what had happened unwittingly following them into the bathroom just in time to see the four of them regurgitating the chicken and vegetable soup into the bathtub.

They moaned together in perfect unison before rinsing out their mouths and shuffling back to bed. Myfanwy felt a bit queasy herself at the sight of the bathtub. She drew the curtain closed and turned on the shower to hopefully wash the sick down the drain. She went back to the bedroom to check on them.

“Water?”

Gestalt looked at her bleary-eyed. She took it as a yes and went to fetch four glasses of water for them. They each took the smallest sip before setting their glasses down and promptly passing out. Myfanwy shut off the shower, too scared to check that the sick was all gone. She stretched out on the couch and fell asleep again.

“I’m dying,” Gestalt moaned the next morning.

“You’re not dying.” Myfanwy measured out the first tablespoon for Teddy.

“I am. I can feel it.” They hadn’t split their voices yet. It was beginning to worry  her.  “My body is shutting down. This is the end for me.”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes as she set to measuring the next tablespoon. “You have the flu.”

“I’m  _ dying _ .” They insisted. “And before I go, I need to tell you something.”

Myfanwy shook her head. “What you need is to keep your water down and take you medicine.”

“Listen, Myfanwy, before I go-”

“Can you shut up about dying?” Myfanwy’s hands shook and she had to stop and take a breath. “You’re fine. You’ll be better in a day or two.”

“But-”

“I mean it. No more talk about you dying.” She measured out the last dose and popped the spoon between Eliza’s lips. “Besides, what would I do? Hm? If I lost my best friend? My  _ only _ friend?” She set the medicine aside. “You really don’t have any other choice except to get better.”

Gestalt stared at her with identical expressions. “Okay,  Myf . I’ll get better.”

Myfanwy smiled and started to stand. Eliza’s hand snatched hers. “Wait.” Myfanwy looked at their bodies. Four hands reaching for her the exact same way, but only one touching her. “Sit with me? Please?”

Myfanwy eased herself back onto the mattress and slid her other hand over Eliza’s. Eight eyes dropped shut. Four faces sagged with relief. Myfanwy sat with them until she was  positive they were asleep again. She wasn’t wrong. Within forty-eight hours, Gestalt was right as rain. A few sniffles here and there, but otherwise they were perfectly fine.

Myfanwy, on the other hand, found herself on the wrong end of a thermometer. She woke up in her bed with Alex fussing about. Her throat was unbelievably sore and her stomach slipped at the slightest provocation. Her entire body felt sapped of its strength. Every tiny movement came at great personal cost.

“Oh, I’m dying,” she mumbled.

Alex smiled at her and rolled his eyes. “You’re not dying.”

Myfanwy shook her head. “No, no. I am.” Alex pushed a tablespoon of cough syrup between her lips as she spoke. She swallowed dutifully and regretted it. “Ugh! It’s horrible!” 

Alex laughed. “And it’ll make you feel loads better. Trust me. Been there, done that.”

Myfanwy nodded and sank into her pillows. Alex made to stand up when Myfanwy grabbed his hand, desperately and unsure why. Alex looked down at her and Myfanwy felt like she could see all of them. Teddy, Eliza, and Robert, all set in Alex’s face. All of Gestalt as one around her.

“Stay with me?” 

Gestalt sat back on the bed and brushed a lock of sweaty hair from her forehead. He patted the back of her hand before bringing it to their lips to kiss her knuckles. “Forever.”


	16. Snow Angels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy gets into trouble.

“We’re going to meet in the rec room at midnight, deal?” Myfanwy wasn’t really asking. They’d learned that pretty early on. Once she got something in her head, it was  follow along or miss out. Gestalt wasn’t the sort to make a mistake more than once.  So they turned up to the rec room at a quarter to midnight just as Myfanwy commanded.

They weren’t alone. Myfanwy had half the institute in the rec room. All whispering and lurking in the dark. Occasionally, someone would giggle or make a show of their EVAs to pass the time. It was five after midnight and everyone was talking about heading back to their rooms when one of the doors opened and Myfanwy came in leading a cluster of children behind her. 

“Okay, Polly,” Myfanwy whispered to the girl beside her. “Just like we practiced, right?”

The girl nodded and bit her bottom lip as she concentrated. Gestalt felt the wind change. Or start. The air shifted and grew colder. Polly shut her eyes and raised her hands above her head before bringing them down and coating the room and all of its occupants in a wet, heavy snow.

“Wow! You did it!” Another little girl cried, hugging Polly and laughing.

Myfanwy caught sight of Gestalt and tramped over. The snow crunched beneath her feet. “You came!”

Gestalt picked up a handful of snow and slapped it down onto the top of her head. “You told us to.”

Myfanwy shook her head and laughed as the snow fell around her. “Well, it’s not going to last long.”

Several of the other kids had started building snowmen and snow forts and arranging teams for a snowball fight. Myfanwy giggled and joined in. Gestalt sat down and watched. Most of the other kids got uncomfortable whenever they were involved. They tended to steer clear, but were more than happy to watch Myfanwy enjoying herself.

The snow was melting and they’d made enough of a ruckus that the handlers had to be on their way down to dole out the punishments. Myfanwy left the snowball fight and came to sit beside them. Gestalt smiled at her easily. She always had the best ideas.

“You’re not playing.” She swiped her hand along the floor and tossed some loose snow at them. They brushed it away.

“I’m having fun.”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes and flopped onto her back. She looked up at them and grinned. She tugged the back of their shirt. “Lay back.”

Gestalt licked their lips and followed her instructions. All four bodies lay in the snow and stared at her. She spread her arms out and started waving them back and forth through the snow. She stopped and looked at them.

“Well?”

Gestalt mimicked her motions until she beamed her patented Myfanwy smile. She sat up and carefully stepped out of the impression she’d made in the snow. She reached down to help one of their bodies up while they picked the other three up themselves. She looked down at their creations and tilted her head to the side.

“You’ve never made snow angels before, have you.” 

Gestalt shuffled shyly. “Nobody would call us angels.”

Myfanwy laughed and grinned up at them. “I would.”

Gestalt blushed. They wanted to say something more. Something sweet and flirty. They couldn’t think of anything. They actually couldn’t even manage the words ‘thank’ and ‘you.’ They were pathetic.

“Look at the mess!” A handler cried.

Myfanwy’s eyes widened and she shoved at their arm. “Run! Runrunrunrunrunrunrun!”

They slipped and slid across the wet floor. Most of the snow had melted away or been moved to form the snow creatures and battle forts. They were in the hallway and trampling back to their rooms before they noticed Myfanwy wasn’t with them anymore.

It wasn’t until the following day that they discovered she’d gone back to get Polly back to her bed and save her from getting into trouble for using her EVA for them. She’d been locked in solitary for her insubordination for three days. Gestalt swore to themselves that they would never leave her to be punished alone again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My shortest fic ever! Woo!


	17. Movie Marathon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy gets Gestalt over to her apartment for a 'movie marathon' but doesn't expect it when they take it so seriously.

Myfanwy nuzzled Robert’s neck, toying with the buttons on his shirt. Eliza moved behind her on the couch as Myfanwy tipped her head up to kiss just under their jaw. Gestalt cleared their throats and adjusted themselves in her living room.

“You don’t seem to be focusing very well,” Teddy accused.

Myfanwy  hummed, her lips pressed against Robert’s throat. “I  think I’m  _ very _ focused.”

Robert and Eliza pulled her back so that she was sitting on the couch and facing the television. “This was  _ your _ idea. The least you could do is watch one movie.”

Myfanwy huffed and rolled her eyes. “Okay, maybe I don’t like the movie.”

“It’s been ten minutes.”

Myfanwy turned her eyes to the screen. She didn’t recognize any of the people and everybody was moving around really fast. The story kept skipping between characters with no rhyme or reason. Myfanwy was quickly becoming bored. “What’s this called?”

“ _ Love, Actually _ ,” Gestalt answered automatically.

Myfanwy frowned at the screen. “Love, actually what?”

“Hm?”

“Love, actually what? What’s the rest?” 

Eliza leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Watch it and find out.”

Myfanwy couldn’t work through the jumbled plotlines. The only thing that was clear was that everyone on screen was getting more than she was. And she had four bodies to contend with. The movie marathon may have been her idea, but it was more of a way to get them over to her place. Alone. At night.

The movie dragged on and never once made any more sense than it did at the start. Myfanwy stood up about forty minutes in with the excuse that she was going to use the bathroom. They offered to pause it to her horror. She shook her head and waved them off. Myfanwy stood in the bathroom and stared at her reflection. She didn’t look any different than usual. Unless Gestalt was getting tired of her.

Her stomach dropped. She’d only ever loved Gestalt in her memories. Everything good was Gestalt. If they were suddenly tired of her or if they decided they didn’t want her anymore she had no idea what to do. Go on, of course. She wasn’t going to force herself on them. But she wouldn’t be able to look at them anymore. Any of them. She’d need to get away. She was better equipped for it now. A life on the run. She had more experience on the inside. She knew what to look out for now. With or without Bronwyn’s help.

Where would she go? Spain looked nice. Warm at least. She could find a place near the sea. Myfanwy sat on her toilet seat and started figuring out a mental route to Spain. Long and looping so as not to arouse suspicion to where she was going to land. Maybe she’d go through Russia. That’d really throw them off the trail.

There was a knock at the door making Myfanwy jump. “Myfanwy? You alright?”

She’d almost completely forgotten they were there with her. She turned on the sink faucet and splashed a few handfuls of water in her face. She was overreacting. She knew she was overreacting. She was bored and horny. That did not mean she ought to run off to Spain first chance she got. Myfanwy patted her face dry with a hand towel before opening the door.

Gestalt didn’t back up as she stepped out of the bathroom forcing her to crane her head back to look them in the eyes. Myfanwy twisted the doorknob in her hand and waited.

“You didn’t really want a movie marathon.”

They looked disappointed. Myfanwy suddenly felt guilty. She’d invited them over for what they thought was a fun evening of watching their favorite movies. Not that Myfanwy had any. Which may have also been why they were so eager to watch films with her. The chance to jar a memory or let her learn something new about herself. And all she could think about was fucking them.

“What? Don’t be silly.” She slid away from them and started back for the couch. 

Teddy grabbed her hand and pulled her back against their chest. He brushed back a piece of hair, wet from the sink. They pressed her back against the wall beside her closet and bumped their nose against hers.

“Honesty, Myfanwy. Remember?” They whispered. Their lips were tantalizingly close. Myfanwy was having trouble focusing on anything other than them.

“Alright, yeah, but we can finish the movie.”

Teddy cracked a smile. “Which movie? You don’t even remember the name.”

Myfanwy frowned. “I do so.”

Teddy tilted his head at her. “Oh, yeah? What’s it called?”

Myfanwy bit her bottom lip. “ _ Love _ something.”

They nodded, pressing their lips together. “Mhm. Now, maybe we can cut the shit and you can tell me what you really want to do tonight.”

Myfanwy looked down and played with her fingers shyly. “You want to watch the movie.”

Teddy’s fingers wove through her hair. “Myfanwy?”

“Hm?”

“Has it occurred to you that I have four bodies? Or that I am capable of doing several things at once?” Myfanwy licked her lips. “Not the least of which includes fucking my girlfriend?”

“You’re going to watch a movie while we fuck?” Myfanwy was trying to decide if she was insulted or not.

Teddy let out a light laugh. “Didn’t say I was going to be able to focus on it.”

Myfanwy moved her hands to his hips. “You know, I was starting to think maybe you were getting bored with me.”

They rolled their eyes. “If only that were possible.”

Myfanwy arched her brow at them. “Oh?”

Teddy nuzzled his nose against hers again. “We’re going to run through every condom in England soon enough. Then what?”

Myfanwy laughed and pressed her lips to theirs. “Mm. Then I guess we move on to  other means.”

Teddy gripped her hips between his hands and backed up until the backs of his knees hit the bed and they sat down, pulling her onto their lap. Myfanwy sighed happily as they pulled off her shirt and nibbled at her neck. She glanced through her bedroom door at Gestalt’s other bodies in the living room. They were  slack jawed and hazy-eyed.

“Tell me how it ends at least?” She said as they rolled her onto her back.

“Same as anything,” Teddy murmured, moving down her belly.

“Which is?”

Teddy’s mouth was too occupied to answer. Myfanwy’s eyes rolled back in her head. When she focused again, Eliza was  lying beside her on the bed. 

“Happily ever after.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of these days I'll write one of these prompt ficlets that actually makes sense.


	18. Family Visits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a whole bunch of shit I made up in my brain.

Gestalt was used to be summoned to Myfanwy’s flat at all hours of the day and night. She’d been having trouble sleeping since being abducted and auctioned. And they understood. Which was a big reason as to why they always showed up whenever she asked. At least, part of it. They weren’t a saint and the sex was really good.

Still, it was unusual for her to call so early in the evening. Even stranger for her to specify that she wanted  _ all four _ bodies to come by. They didn’t know exactly how kinky the past Myfanwy was. They hadn’t had the chance to find out. If new Myfanwy was anything to go by, she was a regular nympho. Not that Gestalt was complaining. Opposite, in fact. It felt like they’d won the  world’s wackiest lottery.

Gestalt stood outside her door holding a bouquet of red roses, a bottle of her favorite red wine, and two bags of burgers and chips. She opened the door looking terrified. Gestalt craned their neck to see into the apartment in case it was something inside that was scaring her.

“Hi.” She stepped out into the hallway with them and pulled the door shut behind her.

“What’s going on?”

Myfanwy looked down at the flowers. A strange look swept across her face before being locked away. “You remember Bronwyn, right?” 

“The sister that had your mind erased and tried to abduct you?” They clarified pointedly.

“How could I forget?”

Myfanwy grimaced. “Yeah, alright. She’s done something a bit... I don’t know. It’s crazy.”

“Crazier than erasing your memories?” Gestalt looked at the closed door to Myfanwy’s flat.

“She’s not trying to steal you away again?” 

Myfanwy sighed. “I can honestly say I don’t know what her angle is.”

“But she’s here?” 

Myfanwy took a deep breath. “She’s not alone.”

Gestalt pulled out one of their guns and cocked it. “She’s not kidnapping you.”

Myfanwy scowled at the gun. “Oh, stop! Put that away! You aren’t shooting my sister.”

Gestalt rolled their eyes. “They’re tranquilizers.”

“I don’t care. Put the gun away or you’re not coming inside.” 

They glared at each other for a moment before sighing and stowing the weapon again. Myfanwy sighed and turned the door knob to her flat.

“Just... brace yourself. And... keep an open mind?” She led them into her flat. They passed her the flowers and set the food and wine on the counter before shrugging out of their coats. Myfanwy crossed to the living room where Bronwyn was seated with a strange, older woman with grey hair.

“Gestalt, you remember Bronwyn.” Bronwyn scowled at them. “And this is  Nadzia Bara.”

Gestalt stared at the women and tried to figure out what the game was. A long-lost aunt of Myfanwy’s she never met? Some trick to get her away from the  Checquy . Away from Gestalt. 

“What do you want with Myfanwy?” They demanded.

“No, they aren’t here for me,” Myfanwy explained. “She’s.... Well, you explain it.” 

Nadzia got to her feet slowly, she hadn’t taken her eyes off of Gestalt since they walked in. It was unsettling that  level of attention. 

“The last time I saw any of you, you were just four years old.” She spoke with a heavy accent.  Nadzia smiled to herself. “I did not think to ever see you again. To ever hear about you again. Not until Miss Thomas found me, that is.”

“Found you why?” Gestalt was beginning to understand Myfanwy’s earlier look of fear. They were feeling it a bit themselves. More than a bit.

“Quadruplets aren’t very common. I often wondered if they told you I had died. Or if you wondered about me at all.”

Gestalt shook a head. Maybe they shook two. “No. No.”

Bronwyn shifted on the couch and leaned toward them. She pointed at  Nadzia and stared up at them. “This is your mother.”

Gestalt glared at her and shook their heads at Nadzia. “You’re lying. And even if it was true, what reason could you possibly have to come here now?”

Nadzia frowned, then. She stooped and picked up a carpet bag to dig through. She pulled out a book and held it out for them. Gestalt stared at it, but made no move to take it. Myfanwy moved between them and took the book from her. 

“I was seventeen when I got pregnant.” She sat back down in the armchair and stared up at them. “Your father proposed to me the minute I told him. I thought everything was going to be perfect. I was so in love with him. We planned to get a little house and raise the baby together. He didn’t make much money at the factory where he worked, but he’d been putting aside money for a few years and was confident he could support us.

“About halfway through the pregnancy, the doctor told me I was having twins. Maybe even triplets. He didn’t know for certain. That was when your father left. It was too much for him, I suppose. He probably would have left whether I had one child or fifty. Still, it broke my heart.

“My parents were wealthy, but they had kicked me out after I told them I was pregnant and without Michal, I was desperate. I started work at a clothing factory. I still work there, even now. And I rented a small flat and I was determined to raise my babies right.” She looked away from them then. Down into her lap.

“It was... very strange. I didn’t have much experience with babies, but you were odd. All of you. You cried together, but as soon as I fed or changed one of you, you would all stop for a moment. You only became stranger as you grew. You spoke all at once. The same things. I didn’t understand it. To be completely honest, I still don’t.

“Someone else noticed, too. When I took you all out to do the shopping or the like. That’s when the government came. They noticed your uniqueness. They offered to take you to a school for children like you. I was barely twenty-one and out of my depth. Completely broke. Just struggling to make ends meet. They were going to take you all off my hands and compensate me for it. But I would never see you again.” She squeezed the carpet bag on her lap. “I was young. I wasn’t ready for that responsibility. Those are the excuses I gave myself all these years.”

Nadzia looked up at them with a small smile. “Looking at you now, I think it was for the best.”

Bronwyn slammed her foot on the floor and stared at the woman. “For the  _ best _ ? You lost the chance to raise your babies!”

Myfanwy tugged their sleeve. They looked down at the book she was holding. There was a photograph of them as babies with  Nadzia . A very young looking  Nadzia . Only a year or two older than Nazim. Myfanwy flipped the page to show them another photo. They were older this time. Maybe one or two. They tilted their heads at the camera identically.

Gestalt wanted to feel some sort of joy at being reunited with their mother, but they could only find suspicion. “What do you want from me, now?”

“Money?” They challenged.

Nadzia’s eyes widened a bit. “I only wanted the chance to explain myself a bit. See what became of you.”

Gestalt narrowed their eyes at her and turned to glare at Bronwyn. “And you? What’s your gain in all this?”

Bronwyn slapped her hands down on the couch and pushed herself up to her feet. “I thought this might jog something free of your shriveled-up hearts. Remind you what it’s like to miss your family.”

“Bronwyn,” Myfanwy warned.

Gestalt shut their eyes and shook their heads in disbelief. “Ah.  So it  _ was _ all a ploy to take Myfanwy away again.”

“Look, I don’t know what spell you’ve put over her, but she won’t leave because of you.”

“I told you why I don’t plan to leave with you. I’m staying by choice and that should be good enough for you,” Myfanwy argued.

Nadzia stood again and brushed her hands down over the side of her carpet bag. “I see now that I should not have come. I only wanted the chance to apologize for any pain I may have caused.”

She started for the door. Myfanwy followed after her, holding out the photo album. Gestalt grimaced and ran a hand down their face. “Wait.” They pointed at the photo album. “Can I have that?”

Nadzia looked at the album in her hand. She ran her fingers lightly over the cover. Taking a deep breath, she held it out for Gestalt to take again. This time they did. She looked at Teddy and Alex and let out a short laugh.

“You know, you two  look just like your father.”

Gestalt grimaced. “What you say, that’s not a compliment.”

Nadzia smiled and shook her head. “He may not have been reliable, but he was very handsome.”

Myfanwy tilted her head at them and grinned. “Oh, Gestalt is  _ very _ reliable.”

Nadzia nodded at them and slipped out the door. Bronwyn was still glaring at them, arms over her chest. Myfanwy cleared her throat to get her attention.

“Alright, you’ve done what you came here to do.” 

Bronwyn broke her eyes away from Gestalt and made her way to the door, grabbing her coat as she went. Myfanwy stopped her before she made it out and wrapped her in a tight hug. Gestalt started pulling the burgers out of the bags. Myfanwy shut the door behind them and leaned at the end of the counter.

“Could’ve given me some warning, you know,” they grumbled.

“I told you to brace yourselves.”

Gestalt slid her burger down the counter to her without looking. Myfanwy picked up a chip and tossed it in her mouth.

“You ever consider I didn’t want to meet her?”

“Your mother?”

Gestalt shrugged. “Whatever. The woman that gave birth to me.”

Myfanwy frowned at her plate for a minute before turning her eyes to the roses and wine. “You’re just pissed because you thought I called you over here for sex.” She took a bite of her burger. “Maybe I should’ve taken you into the bedroom for a quickie before introducing you. You’d have been a lot nicer I suspect.”

Gestalt choked on their food and aimed for indignant. “Wouldn’t have changed a thing.”

Myfanwy set her burger down and reached out to touch their cheek. “Does that mean you weren’t hoping for sex?”

Gestalt grabbed her hand and pressed their lips to her fingertips. “Fucking warn me next time.”

Myfanwy giggled. “You have another long-lost mother for Bronwyn to dig up?” 

Gestalt soured. “If she dredges up my father, turn her away.”

Myfanwy draped her arms around their neck and nodded seriously. “Duly noted.”

Gestalt stood up and pushed her back towards the bedroom. “No more talking about my mother, alright?”

Myfanwy nodded and sat down on the bed. Gestalt followed her down, pushing her back. They sealed their lips together and closed their eyes forgetting the past half hour. Myfanwy dragged herself further up the bed. Gestalt moved focus to her neck.

“Can we still talk about how adorable you were as babies?” Myfanwy asked.

Gestalt pulled their head back and glared down at her. “No.”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes with a grin. “Aw, c’mon. Those little booties you had on? So sweet.”

Gestalt pressed their fingers over her lips. “Stop.”

Myfanwy shook herself free. “That frilly dress Eliza was wearing?”

Gestalt sat back and groaned. Myfanwy jumped up and sat down on their lap before they could leave. She kissed them desperately.

“Okay, okay, okay. I’m done.” She kissed them again more fiercely. “Just.... Did you notice this was the first time our whole families have been under the same roof?”

Gestalt kissed her again and frowned. They hadn’t considered that. The strange normalness of it. Meeting your significant others’ families. It was something that happened to other people. Not to  Checquy agents. Not to them. Not before Myfanwy, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's right. Back on my angsty bullshit. Your welcome!


	19. Gingerbread

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friendly competition.

“I don’t understand why this is such a difficult concept for you.” Myfanwy finished filling the piping bag with white icing and set it aside. Eliza picked up a yellow gumdrop and tossed it into her mouth. She pointed at the assortment of gingerbread, candy, icing, and other decorating necessities.

“Seems pointless is all. The houses always get torn apart in order to eat them. Or they go to waste. Never really gotten it. Since when did ‘don’t play with your food’ get thrown out the window?” 

Myfanwy groaned and put her hands on the table. She’d been aiming for fun and festive. And maybe it would have been. If Gestalt didn’t drag their heels at anything that wasn’t strictly protocol. They could never do anything just because it sounded like fun.

“Sometimes, you’re a really hard best friend to have,” she announced.

Eliza looked over at her, wide eyed and innocent. “What?”

Myfanwy gestured at the table set up. “Can’t we just have fun?”

Eliza frowned down at the stack of square ginger crisps. “You said it was a competition.”

Myfanwy bobbed her head. “Yeah, a fun competition.”

Their eyes narrowed at Myfanwy. “What’s the prize?”

Myfanwy grinned. She’d got them on the hook and it had only taken an hour of griping. “Ah, I was thinking about that. I thought I’d get a little trophy with the winner’s name stamped on it, but I know how you like things that are useful to you and I figured it out.”

Eliza held her hands out palms up. “And that is?”

“Oh. The winner gets to ask the loser for one thing – can be absolutely anything at all – and the loser has to give it to them.”

Eliza’s eyes tripped around her apartment before landing back on Myfanwy. “You don’t really have anything I can’t get myself.”

Myfanwy scowled at them. “So confident you’re going to win? You didn’t even understand the concept of house making.”

“I can ask for anything at all? Like if I ask you to jump out the window, you’d have to do it?” Eliza asked.

“If you want me dead, you have a gun.”

“I have to file a six page form every time I fire a bullet. Besides, I don’t really like the idea of prison.”

Myfanwy picked up a chocolate square and launched it at  Eliza’s forehead. “You’d cry if I died and we both know it.”

Eliza frowned and nodded. “I was joking. I’d never ask for that.”

“I know.” Myfanwy picked up her phone and set the timer. “Alright, we have one hour. Starting...now!”

Myfanwy set to forming the base of her house. She had a floorplan in mind. She was going to build her childhood house in gingerbread form. She glanced up at Eliza a few times throughout the hour to inspect their progress. They looked to be making a bunch of cubes. She wondered if they were confused on the aspect of ginger house building. Bricks were generally not needed.

She was only half finished with her house in Horsham when the timer went off. Myfanwy groaned and set her piping bag down. Still, had to be better than a cluster of cubes. Myfanwy looked over at Gestalt’s work and her mouth fell open. They had built Old  Glengrove from their cubes. They’d even used toothpicks and gumdrops to make children.

“What’d you make?” Eliza asked, staring at her house. The roof had already started falling in.

Myfanwy sighed in defeat. “Doesn’t matter. Suppose I’ll throw myself out the window now.” 

Eliza moved around to the other side of the table and set her hands on the table on either side, barring her exit. Myfanwy stared into her green eyes wanting, not for the first time, to kiss them. If only she weren’t such a supreme fuck up. 

“I told you that’s not what I’ll ask for.”

Myfanwy nodded. “Fine, fine. What do you want?”

Eliza’s eyes dropped down to her lips and back. They licked their lips and leaned forward. Myfanwy’s heart skipped a beat. It was as if Gestalt were reading her mind. A slow smile crept across Eliza’s face. She leaned forward a fraction of an inch before twirling away.

“You have to approve the Dublin acquisitions request form.”

Myfanwy stared after them, desperately trying to wrangle her libido. “What? Oh, no! No work stuff!”

Eliza frowned back at her. “You said  _ anything _ .”

Myfanwy stared at the table, littered with their creations and the mess they’d made in making them. She sighed. “Fine. I’ll do it Monday.”

Eliza dropped onto her couch and put their feet up and their hands under their head. “Sweet victory.”

Myfanwy snapped the sunken roof of her house between her fingers. If she’d been just a bit  quicker she’d be the one getting something from Gestalt. She bit into the ginger crisp and let her fingers drift over her lips, imagining Gestalt’s lips on them. She should’ve picked something easier to build.


	20. Apricity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set days before Myfanwy's first appointment with Bird Cunt. There are more misunderstandings between Gestalt and Myfanwy than there are hairs on a dog. See if you can spot them all!

Myfanwy hunkered down in front of the fire. It was an overnight excursion. Not a weekend away. Not even out away from the Institute like a normal survival training exercise. They were set up in the field over a hill from the main house.  They other students had formed pods and set up tents and fires in small circles. It didn’t stop the cold from biting through them.

Gestalt wished they could do more than add a few branches to the fires. All of the fires currently going were thanks to the three fire starters at the Institute. Displaying their handiness for when teams were chosen for the final test. Valuable team members were often bought with smuggled snacks and somewhat illegal items. It was still a year away for Myfanwy and Gestalt. Not that they were interested in their classmates’ abilities. They were top of the class in every subject including tracking and survival.

Myfanwy, on the other hand, was woefully behind. She shivered violently and scooted so close to the fire that she was more likely to catch herself on fire than keep herself warm. Gestalt moved two bodies over to either side of her to block the wind. Myfanwy looked over at them and smiled. Her lips were blue.

“Remind me the point of this exercise?” She asked through chattering teeth.

They held Eliza’s and Alex’s hands out to warm on the fire. “Just to make it through the night.”

Myfanwy scowled at the hill. The main house lay behind it. “It’s like they  _ want _ us to die.”

“Survival of the fittest, yeah?” They agreed, using Alex.

Myfanwy frowned at the flames. “Thought that was the point of the tracking and survival training weekends.”

“Call it a warm up.”

Myfanwy sucked in a breath between her teeth. “A freeze off, more like.”

“Just wait until the sun comes back up, yeah?” They reached around her shoulders tentatively. She didn’t shake them off. They rubbed their hands up and down her arms trying to generate heat through friction.

Myfanwy nodded at the flames. “I’ll just sit here all night.”

Gestalt laughed. “You’ll be warmer in the tent.”

Myfanwy shook her head firmly. “Nope. Fire is warm. Tent is cold.”

“The tent has blankets.” 

“ _ Cold _ blankets.”

Gestalt rolled their eyes. “They’ll warm up once you’re in them.”

She shook her head again. “ Gotta have body heat to warm up the blankets. My body is cold.”

“ _ My _ bodies are warm. We’re all in one tent.” Gestalt was glad for the dark. The orange glow cast by the fire and the cold air made their blushing invisible.

They stood from the fire all at once. A mistake. It drew attention to their fire from the other camps. Gestalt noticed eyes on them. They walked one body at a time to the tent. By the time the second body had gone inside, the attention died down and everyone went back to their own conversations.

They reached down for Myfanwy with Eliza’s hand. “I promise you’ll be warm.”

Myfanwy took their hand reluctantly and let them pull her away from the fire and into the tent. She was quiet as they arranged the sleeping bags with Myfanwy’s in the middle. They unzipped them all and used two as padding. They pulled Myfanwy down between their four bodies and covered themselves with two more blankets. The third they draped over Myfanwy for added warmth. Myfanwy trembled from the cold. Eliza wasn’t normally in the middle when they slept as one, but they wanted Myfanwy to feel comfortable.

Gradually, they all drifted to sleep. When they woke up, the sun was just barely streaming through the small, plastic window at the top of their tent. Myfanwy had moved at some point in the night. Her face was buried in Alex’s neck. Her arms tight around them. She was still sleeping peacefully. Her even breaths tickled their skin.

It would have been absolutely perfect if they weren’t also rock hard. Of course, she had to glue herself to one of their boy bodies. At least Eliza’s arousal could be hidden. All three of their male bodies were sporting very obvious hard  ons . They started to count down from one hundred. That generally worked for them when they had  a inconvenient stiffy.

Myfanwy hummed and snuggled tighter to them. That was it. They couldn’t take anymore. They shoved her away and darted out of the tent like bullets from a gun. They were about half a mile from camp with all four bodies before they stopped to catch their breath. Running had helped as had the cold air. Boners were gone. The feel of Myfanwy pressed against their chests and the sound of her soft humming in their ear was seared into their brains for all eternity.

They walked back to camp slowly, picking up wood for the fire as they went. They wouldn’t be allowed back into the main house until noon. No one else was awake when they returned. It was barely after five in the morning. Gestalt dropped the wood at the fire and used their flint to restart it. Myfanwy emerged from the tent after a few minutes. She tucked her hair behind her ear and avoided looking at them.

_ Fuck. She probably felt it this morning. _

_ She’s creeped out by you now. _

_ Thinks you’re a right pervert. _

_ And you are. _

Myfanwy rubbed her hands up and down her arms, but walked away from the fire towards the hill. They grimaced. She absolutely hated them now. An hour passed and Gestalt finally mustered the courage to send Eliza up the hill to talk to her.

“Morning,” they greeted.

“Morning.”

They followed her gaze down to the institute. “About this morning....”

“No worries. I understand.”

Gestalt’s shoulders sagged with relief.  Of course she understood. She’d had boyfriends before coming to  Glengrove . She was experienced. More so than Gestalt.  Of course she’d understand what had happened.

“So, you’ll come back to the fire?”

Myfanwy took a deep breath through her nose and shut her eyes. “I actually feel warm right here. I can feel the sun and almost imagine it’s spring already.”

Gestalt stared at her. She was breathtaking. Unnerving. They’d never been so taken with anyone in their life. They strongly doubted such a feeling would ever come over them again. 

“Apricity.”

Myfanwy opened her eyes and looked at them. “What?”

They cleared their throat and tucked their hair behind their ear delicately. “That’s what you’re feeling. It’s called  apricity . The feeling of being warmed by the sun in winter.”

Myfanwy arched her brow at them. One corner of her mouth hitched up in amusement. “I don’t know what fascinates me more; that there is a word for that or that you  _ know _ the word for it.”

Gestalt rolled their eyes at  her, glad the awkwardness was over. “Come on, would you? I’m making breakfast.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm gonna be honest, guys. This one feels clunky as hell to me. Sorry. I'll do better tomorrow!!


	21. My Car Broke Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure, but this feel like an alternate timeline. I have no clue.

“Yeah, yeah, hold on!” Myfanwy shouted at the ringing phone. She looked at the cluttered kitchen counter as she held the tray of chocolate chip. “Ahh!” She yelled at nothing before balancing the hot tray at the edge of her sink and ripping off her oven mitts to answer the phone.

“Hello?”

“Myfanwy?” Alex said on the other end. Her shoulders sagged. Only Gestalt. Not some last minute, now or never phone call that might change her life. Conrad calling her up to send her on an undercover mission to topple the seedy criminal underclass that was human trafficking. Just Gestalt.

“Do you need something?” She asked, eyeing the tray on her sink that was teetering uneasily.

“Are you busy?”

“I was making biscuits. What’s going on?” She darted over to grab the tray before it crashed into the sink before ripping her hand away again to yowl in pain. 

_ Stupid _ , she thought before glaring at the biscuits as if they’d conspired to burn her.

“If you’re busy, I don’t want to bother you.”

“Can you just spit it out?” She whined. “Please?”

Alex cleared his throat. “My car broke down?”

“Okay?” She didn’t see why that entailed calling her. They always took two cars everywhere anyway. 

Alex huffed into the receiver making it crackle. “I’m out near Brighton and my car broke down and I can’t leave the office because I have to track down this target Grantchester’s been on me about and the vehicle depot is closed until Monday morning so I’m stuck here.”

Myfanwy stared at her pinkened palm. She frowned thoughtfully. “You want me to come pick you up, you mean?”

“Not if it’s any trouble.”

Myfanwy smiled and leaned back against the counter. “Oh, I could manage a little trouble for you, Gestalt.”

“Thanks, Myf-”

“Provided I’m properly rewarded.” She grinned viciously at the heavy silence on the line. 

After a full minute, she heard two distinct voices saying at once, “That can be arranged.”

Myfanwy giggled and slid on her shoes. “Send me your location and I’ll be there.”

She hung up and slipped into her coat. She grabbed a biscuit as she left. Her phone buzzed once she was seated in her car. Gestalt sending her their location. She stuck the biscuit in her mouth and brushed the crumbs from her fingers to open the message.

**TEDDY:**   
**Preston Park Hotel**

Myfanwy grinned to herself as she backed out of her spot and started towards Brighton. A long trip. Almost two hours of driving at night. Thankfully, the traffic wasn’t so bad as it was at midday. She passed Gestalt’s Range Rover as she pulled into the hotel parking lot.

Gestalt was waiting in the hotel lobby for her. “Pretty convenient, your car breaking down in front of a hotel.”

Teddy scowled at her. “ _ I _ didn’t think so.”

Myfanwy laid her palm on the center of his chest and looked up at him. “If you’ve got a key to a room, I’ll wager I can change your mind.”

He didn’t smile or give away any indication that we  was at all aroused. They grabbed her hand from their chest and pulled her to the lifts. She tipped her head at them.

“You plan on telling me what you’re doing in Brighton before or after?” 

Teddy stared at her impassively and led her down the hall to a room. The door opened as they reached it with Alex on the other side. They pushed and pulled her into the room, kicking the door shut behind them. Teddy’s mouth dropped onto hers while Alex pressed themselves against her back and began relieving her of her clothes. 

Myfanwy shoved Teddy’s suit jacket from his shoulders and began working at the buttons on his shirt beneath. Alex licked the curve of her neck making her gasp. She reached up and threaded her fingers through his curls, holding them there. Gestalt urged her back to the bed. Kissing and licking and wrestling her clothes from her.

She was lost for a moment – a minute or an hour – in blind ecstasy. When she finally came around again, Gestalt was snoring around her. She took a deep breath before immediately wondering if she remembered to turn the oven off.

“Not yet,” Teddy mumbled into the pillows. His hair was beyond messy. Alex’s disheveled look was relatively unchanged from the norm.

“What’re you doing in Brighton?” Myfanwy asked, sitting up.

Gestalt groaned and sat up on either side of her. “I thought I had a lead on an EVA, but it dried up.”

Myfanwy arched her brow at Teddy. “ So you decided to check into the nearest hotel and make me drive for two hours?”

“My car broke down.”

“A convenient excuse to get someone into a hotel room to fuck them,” Myfanwy challenged.

Teddy narrowed his eyes at  her.  Alex’s voice sounded in her ear. “At the risk of sounding like a pervert, you  _ did _ ask for it.”

Myfanwy pressed her lips together. “One measly orgasm in exchange for four hours of driving?” 

“One?” Teddy repeated.

“Three, at least.” 

Myfanwy pouted. “ _ Four  _ hours.”

“Four hours,” Alex mocked in a  high pitched voice making Myfanwy giggle as Teddy gripped her thigh and pulled her underneath them again.

They ended up following the vehicle depot’s tow truck back to the office on Monday morning anyway.


	22. Skiing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Farrier thinks Myfanwy needs to chill and Gestalt gets to babysit.

“Is it still a vacation if it’s mandatory?” Myfanwy complained. She was adorable all wrapped in her puffy winter coat with two scarves around her neck and face, a beanie on her head, and mittens stuck over the top of her gloves. 

Farrier had sent her to the Swiss Alps for some time off to relax. If Farrier knew the first thing about her, it would have been clear that the word ‘relax’ was not in Myfanwy’s vocabulary. Eliza and Teddy were her assigned escorts. Just because it was meant to be a vacation for her didn’t mean Vultures wouldn’t leap at the opportunity.

“It’s a vacation if you do vacation-y things,” Eliza said, brightly. They wanted her to have  fun.  To relax. Whether she knew the meaning or not.

Myfanwy scowled at them as the gondola reached the peak of the mountain. She leaned forward and dropped down forcing Gestalt to follow her. Teddy was warm by the fire in the lodge. It made it easy enough for them to forget the chill on their Eliza body.

Myfanwy didn’t have that luxury. By the time they reached the lodge again, she was shivering even beneath her layers. Gestalt fed her hot chocolate and took her up to her room for privacy while she warmed back up. 

“ Who’s idea was it to go skiing?” She demanded from beneath a mound of blankets.

“Farrier’s.”

Myfanwy scoffed. “God, I hate her sometimes.”

Eliza gasped loudly. “Ooh, I’m telling!”

Myfanwy narrowed her eyes at them. “I’ll bury you on this fucking mountain. They’ll never find your bodies.”

Gestalt laughed and flipped on the television. Myfanwy picked up one of the resort’s brochures and flipped through it. “There’s a spa,” she announced.

“You want to get a massage?” 

She dropped the brochure on her nightstand and crawled out of her blanket mountain. “Might as well. I’ll be damned if I go skiing again.”

Gestalt called and made three appointments for the spa. Full service because, well, why not? Not to mention a back massage sounded like heaven right then. They tramped downstairs and parted ways between Eliza and Myfanwy and Teddy. Women to one side, men to the other.

All the masseuses were women. Once they were all on the massage tables, it didn’t really matter if their bodies were male or female. They wished they could just have all their bodies treated the same once. They could have fallen asleep beneath their masseuses’ hands. If they weren’t exceedingly aware that Myfanwy Thomas was naked in the same room as them.

Not that she cared.

Gestalt sat up on the table and stared at the wall for a moment. Myfanwy sat up and stretched, her breasts bared for all to see. Teddy’s masseuse was turned away rifling through some container. She came back around and smiled at him. She was pretty. Not Myfanwy pretty, but attractive nonetheless.

“I could help you with that, if you’d like.”

“’ Scuse me?”

She gestured at their lap and Gestalt grimaced at their erection. They were grateful for the body separation now when only minutes before they had been annoyed by it. Gestalt shut their eyes and rolled their heads back and began counting backwards.

“Is that a no?” 

“Yes.”

She moved towards them. Quickly, they held up a hand to stop her. “No. I mean, yes it’s a no.”

The masseuse looked wildly disappointed. They stood, keeping the towel fastened about their waist. The erection was quickly fading as they moved to the mud baths. Myfanwy sighed and leaned back. 

“Why did we not just come straight to the spa?” She asked.

Gestalt picked up a handful of mud and stared at it.  _ To spare my sanity, maybe? _

_ “ _ Let’s do the buffet for dinner,” they suggested. They needed to focus on something other than Myfanwy’s naked body.

“Yeah, alright. I want to get a  mani / pedi before we go.”

They were allowed to be together for that. They sat at tables on either side of Myfanwy while three more women worked on their hands. Myfanwy glanced over at  Teddy’s nail stylist and then up at him with one of her wild grins. Their stomachs twisted.

“Paint them red.”

“What?” They looked down at their fingernails, freshly oiled. 

“You heard me,” Myfanwy accused.

Teddy scowled at her. “Not happening.”

Myfanwy looked at the assortment of nail polish beside her. She frowned in thought. “Blue, then? Like a five hundred and eleven? Or maybe a two hundred and seventy?”

Gestalt looked at the shades she mentioned. One was a baby blue while the other was a bit darker, but glittery. They shook their head at her.

“Absolutely not.”

Myfanwy jutted her bottom lip out at them. “Coward.”

“I have an image.”

“You’re on vacation.”

“ _ You’re  _ on vacation,” they countered.  _ I’m just the help _ .

Myfanwy dropped her eyes back to her own table. Defeated. Gestalt groaned to themselves. They were an idiot, but they were an idiot that would do anything to make Myfanwy smile. They quietly told their nail stylist to paint them the glittery blue. It was pretty. They’d admit it. They might even be inclined to buy something similar for their Eliza body.

They hid their hands throughout dinner. A difficult feat when you need your hands to eat. Myfanwy was easy enough to distract. They’d play a game with the other strangers in the dining area. They’d point to someone and one of them would have to make up a story about where they were from, why they were there, and what they were talking about at that moment.

It was chilly in the restaurant. Likely a tactic to keep people from spending all day in the dining area. Myfanwy shivered so Gestalt shrugged Teddy out of their jacket and draped it over her shoulders. Myfanwy smiled and tucked her arms into the sleeves, rolling them up to her elbows so she could eat. It was late by the time they finally made it back to their room.

Myfanwy shoved her hand in Teddy’s suit jacket pocket after the card key. She frowned and pulled it and something else from their pocket. She held the card key out for them while she flipped over a client card from the spa.

“Who is Lana?” 

Gestalt frowned at her. “Who?”

“Lana.” She turned the card around so they could see what she was reading. 

_ Call me if you change your mind and need a ‘hand’ or maybe something more. _

_ XO _

_ Lana _

Her phone number was scrawled across the bottom of the card. Gestalt stared at it uncomprehendingly before they remembered the masseuse. They turned away and opened the door to their suite. Myfanwy’s room was attached to theirs. A safety measure.

“She was my  masseuse earlier.” 

Myfanwy arched her brow. “Oh? Gave you a happy ending, did she?”

Gestalt shook their heads. “I’m not that easy.”

“Aren’t you, though?” 

Gestalt stilled. “Excuse me?”

Myfanwy shrugged and stared at the floor. “Being ‘easy’ is part of your job, isn’t it? Sleeping with people for information and all that.”

Gestalt felt hollow. They hated that aspect of their job and Myfanwy damn well knew that. She also knew that they very rarely did much more than kiss their targets. They assumed she did, at least. They’d assumed Myfanwy thought more of them than that they were just prostitutes being pimped out by the government. 

“Not all of us get to hide behind a desk,” they snapped.

Myfanwy stared at them. A mirror of the fire in their eyes in hers. She turned and stomped through the door to her adjoining room, slamming the door as she went. Gestalt ripped the card up into quarters and dropped it in the wastebasket before dropping onto their bed. She could be such a pain. Aggravating and hypocritical and mean.

Gestalt paused to look down at their painted nails. She’d been so deliriously giddy just moments earlier. They were almost inclined to think she was relaxing. She flipped like a switch to the rage monster that stormed from the room.

They hated her.

They loved her.

They were being driven completely mad by her.

Fifteen minutes after storming out, there was a small knock at the door between their rooms. They swung one body off the bed to open it for her. She stared down at the floor between them and pulled at the hem on the sleeve of her resort robe. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said.” 

Gestalt sighed heavily. “I didn’t mean it either.”

Myfanwy chewed at the inside of her bottom lip before shyly looking up at them. “You... you planning on calling that masseuse?” She peeked further into the room. A small smile lifted the corner of her lips when she saw Teddy still on the bed. “They have  _ Funny Face  _ on the demand channel here.”

Gestalt let themselves grin freely. Myfanwy scurried over to the bed and flopped down between them. They grabbed the television remote from the nightstand and flipped through to find the movie. Myfanwy pulled a pillow onto her lap and leaned into Eliza’s shoulder.

“If it weren’t for the skiing, this would be the perfect vacation.”


	23. Present Shopping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gestalt and Myfanwy get each other material things, but it's the thought that counts.

How is it that you never really know how little you know about a person until you’re trying to buy them a present? Or is it four presents? What was the standard there? Four bodies, yes. That would insinuate four presents. But they were all one person. One mind. That should mean she need only buy one. Maybe some sort of scale? Like she could buy four more affordable things or one really big and expensive thing? Or would that insult them?

“Is there anything I can help you with?” 

Myfanwy didn’t realize the saleswoman was talking to her at first. She’d been standing in the shop for more than forty-five minutes at that point. She’d looked at watches briefly, but one was already more expensive than her monthly rent and she’d have to buy four of them. She’d moved on to electronics. They had a television, yes, but it was small and the picture was terrible. Then again, she’d never actually seen Gestalt watch anything on it.

“Just browsing,” she answered, staring down at the array of gift sets.

“Shopping for a boyfriend? Or girlfriend?” The saleswoman asked.

“Yeah,” Myfanwy murmured, tilting her head at a shaving kit. Robert’s grooming was very particular. They might not like whatever set she picked out for them.

“Girlfriend, then?” The woman moved down the aisle and picked up a set of makeup brushes complete with their own carrying bag. “This is one of the most popular  gift sets we have this year.”

Myfanwy twisted her mouth in thought. Eliza rarely did more with her makeup than a touch of mascara and a touch of lipstick occasionally. Unless she was on a mission. Maybe she could use some makeup brushes. Or the R&D department already gave her special brushes. Ones that doubled as lasers or something insane.

“I think they have those already.”

The saleswoman nodded and set it down again. “Did I see you over in jewelry? There’s a lovely necklace there. Very pretty. Sapphires and diamonds.”

Myfanwy shook her head. “Too much. If I buy one thing it has to be... communal.”

That earned her an odd look. Professionalism kept the woman from prying further as she moved on to her next pitch. “Is she a girly-girl? Or more of a tomboy?”

Myfanwy stared blankly at the saleswoman honestly unsure how to answer that question. Gestalt was somehow both and neither. And bloody  _ fucking  _ difficult to shop for. She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her fingers against the bridge of her nose.

“Hypothetically, let’s say you had to get someone four presents. Preferably unique. What would you get?” Myfanwy hedged.

“I suppose it depends on the person. I’d think about their hobbies first. Things their interested in. I’d try to find something that reminded me of who they are as a person, maybe. And, when in doubt, something from the heart always means the most.” 

Myfanwy fought the urge to roll her eyes. ‘From the heart’ meant homemade and cheap. Besides, what was she going to make? She was shit at everything. Including the  job she was still relearning how to do. She didn’t know them. Not well enough to answer twenty questions about their hobbies and interests. They liked music, but it was hard to pin down an artist or a genre. They liked working out and sparring, but they had free access to the best gym in the country. And they liked fucking, but they did that almost every day anyway so it wasn’t like it was a super special present.

Still undecided, Myfanwy left the shop without buying anything. She dropped by Gestalt’s flat hoping to unearth some clues as to what they might like. Noble intentions or not, they all ended up naked and piled up on their bed. It wasn’t until she was walking into work the next morning that she remembered why she’d gone over in the first place.

Myfanwy worked through the first stack of papers Ingrid brought her before hopping onto one of the online shopping websites and praying for inspiration. She was still scrolling at lunchtime. Her mind had gone to mush after she’d pushed and pulled at it for hours trying to think of something Gestalt would actually enjoy.

She was running out of time. With two days left, she gave in and began buying anything she thought might be remotely close to something Gestalt would enjoy. She had everything gift wrapped and dropped it all under the fake Christmas tree set up in her flat. Her immediate instinct was that she had gone overboard. She went to bed feeling utterly humiliated.

Gestalt came over at noon on Christmas day. They kissed her cheeks and set to work on Christmas dinner. Myfanwy hoped they wouldn’t get too curious about the number of presents under the tree. All for them since she’d given Ingrid, Conrad, and Danielle their gifts days ago. She had something for Farrier and Bronwyn, too, but they were hidden in her closet in the event she ever saw them again.

They ate and laughed and teased each other. Gestalt went through her albums to find the singular Christmas themed album she had and started it playing. Gestalt pulled up a red and gold gift bag and held it out to her.

“Happy Christmas.”

The bag was heavier than she thought it’d be. She nodded towards the assortment under the tree. “Don’t laugh at me.”

Gestalt looked at her and the tree. “Laugh at what?”

Myfanwy set the bag on the counter and sat beside the tree. She checked the names she’d scribbled on each of them to make sure the right bodies opened certain gifts. Not that it mattered. She slid them into four piles of four on the kitchen table and set her hands on her hips.

Gestalt stared expressionlessly at the gifts. Myfanwy could practically hear their thoughts. They were so obvious. Eliza nodded at the bag on the counter.

“You first.”

Myfanwy reached into the bag and pulled out a flat, square box wrapped in paper matching the bag. She pulled the paper off to reveal a jewelry case. Myfanwy opened the lid. It was a necklace. Platinum with diamonds and sapphires inlaid. She smiled remembering the saleswoman who tried selling her an almost identical necklace to give to them.

“Thank you. It’s gorgeous.”

Teddy coughed and tugged at their ear. “Keep going.”

Myfanwy’s brows drew together. She dipped her hand back into the bag and pulled out another wrapped box. She glanced up at them curiously before opening the present. A bottle of rose oil perfume sat in a bed of velvet.

“You know, you really didn’t have to, but thank you.” 

Alex shook their head and pointed at the bag again. “No, no. There’s more.”

Myfanwy frowned at them. She dipped her hand back into the bag to retrieve yet another wrapped gift. This time, it was a pair of slipper socks. Myfanwy laughed.

“What?” 

She looked up at Gestalt’s worried faces. Myfanwy set the socks on the counter beside the necklace and perfume and dug through their piles for a moment, handing them each one of their gifts. They ripped the paper off and chuckled at the four pairs of slipper socks in their hands.

“We think alike,” Myfanwy smiled.

Robert set their hand on her waist and guided her back to the bag. “One more.”

Myfanwy kept their eye as she dipped her hand into the bag again and pulled out a slightly larger box than the necklace was in though this box was lighter. She opened it and stared down at the black silk lingerie set. She felt her cheeks heat.

“Bedroom.”

“Now?” Robert asked, feigning innocence.

“I haven’t even opened my presents yet,” Alex whined.

Myfanwy grabbed Robert by the collar of his shirt in both hands. “Multitask.” She hauled Gestalt back towards the bedroom, sealing her lips over theirs as they went.

“You don’t want to try on the lingerie?” Eliza asked.

“Later.” Myfanwy relieved Robert of his shirt and wriggled free of her dress. Eliza kissed her deeply while Robert’s mouth moved further south. Myfanwy hummed with delight, raking her fingers through Robert’s hair in one hand and grabbing a fistful of Eliza’s in the other.

“Oh, fleece blankets,” Eliza said, breaking away. Myfanwy licked and nipped at her neck. “Thank you!”

Myfanwy hummed a ‘ your welcome’ while unzipping Eliza’s dress to find her breasts. 

“Scarves. You can never have too many scarves,” Eliza continued.

Myfanwy’s head dropped back onto the mattress as Gestalt started hitting the perfect spot. She clenched her fist tighter in Eliza’s hair, holding her face close but not able to kiss her for all the panting.

“And coffee mugs. Cute.”

“Fuck!” Myfanwy cried as she came. 

“You know, it’s like you bought me every gift from the past five years all at once.”

Myfanwy panted hard, kissing Eliza. “Sorry, didn’t remember.”

Gestalt laughed around her. “You know if you want to insist on getting me something, you only have to get one thing.”

“I told you not to laugh at me,” Myfanwy grumbled.

Eliza pulled her head back and pulled a nipple between their teeth. “I’m not laughing at you, love.” Teddy held themselves over her.

“I love my presents.” Alex took her other nipple in their mouth.

Robert sat up between her legs. “Though, this one will always be my favorite.”

Myfanwy gasped as they filled her and reached up to pull Teddy’s mouth to hers. She broke away for a brief moment. “It’s the thought that counts.”


	24. Flannel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short and sweet.

Myfanwy yawned and stretched. Her hand knocked against Teddy’s jaw so she grabbed his chin and pulled his face over to kiss his cheek. Robert picked up her other hand to return kiss while Teddy kept his focus on the computer screen in front of them. Myfanwy stood up and stretched again before shuffling off to the bathroom after a shower.

It had grown impossibly cold over the past few weeks. She dried her hair and dressed in her warmest pajamas, adding a fresh pair of fleece socks for added warmth. Myfanwy stepped back out into the living area, stopping in the kitchen for a glass of water. It was getting late and they had work in the morning. Not that Gestalt had stopped working.

“Are you staying? Because I’m headed to bed.”

Four heads turned to look at her. Teddy pulled back the sleeve on his shirt to check the time on his watch. “This late already?” The mused.

“I don’t mind if you do stay, but there isn’t as much room in my bed as there is in yours.” Myfanwy glanced at the mattress over her shoulder. “Someone always ends up on the floor.”

Eliza was squinting at her now. Myfanwy cocked her head at them waiting for them to say what was on their mind. “What are you wearing?”

Myfanwy looked down at herself. “Pajamas?”

Alex moved forward and pinched the material between his fingers. “What is it? Flannel?”

Myfanwy snatched her sleeve away and glared at them. “It’s cold in here.”

Eliza stood and looped their arms around Myfanwy’s waist. “Did we suddenly get old?”

“What?”

Eliza grabbed her lapel and squeezed it between their fingers. “What happened to slinky lingerie and seducing me into your bed?”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes, a small smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Winter happened. If you expect sexy lingerie, maybe we should go  some place warm.”

Eliza tugged her closer and knocked their foreheads together lightly. “Enticing. If only there weren’t so much work here.”

“Surely we’re owed some vacation?” Myfanwy pressed. The more she thought about it, the more she liked the idea of having Gestalt all to herself for a few days in a warmer climate.

Gestalt gave in and kissed her then. Myfanwy squeezed Eliza’s hips and pulled her closer. San Sebastian, maybe? Palermo could be nice. Or Corfu. She felt the mattress beneath her back then.

“Let’s go  some place sunny,” she tried.

Gestalt smirked at her. “Let’s get you out of the granny flannel.” 

Myfanwy helped them pull her pajama bottoms down, catching their head before they could distract her. “I mean it. Let’s go somewhere just us. No work.” She saw a losing battle. “Before we really do get old?”

Gestalt leaned forward and kissed her again. “I’ll talk to Conrad tomorrow.”

Teddy appeared behind her, kissing her neck. “So long as you promise me one thing.”

Myfanwy leaned into them while Eliza kissed across her flat belly. “Mm, anything, oh.”

Teddy nipped at her earlobe making her squirm. “Burn the fucking flannel. I can keep you as warm as you like.”

Myfanwy found Alex and pulled their lips to hers. “Deal. And I’m thinking Palermo.”

True to their word, Gestalt kept her plenty warm without a stitch of clothing on her body. She may not have burned the flannel regardless. Instead, she stashed it away in the back of her closet for a future emergency she couldn’t foresee. Gestalt would never see her in it again anyway.


	25. Volunteer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some time after The Rook. Myfanwy wants to be a field agent.

Sparring mats have a saltier taste than one might expect. Perhaps from all the sweat dropped onto them during the fighters’ sparring sessions. They also tasted of iron. Or maybe that was just the blood in her mouth. Bitter as the taste may have been, Myfanwy lay face down and continued tasting it for a while longer for just a moment’s rest. 

“On your feet!” Teddy barked. “I ain’t got all day and if you expect to become a bona fide field agent, you need all the training you can get.” 

Myfanwy moaned into the mat and pushed herself onto her hands and knees. Every muscle in her body ached. Her bones might have actually creaked with the effort it took to get to her feet. Gestalt always pissed and moaned about taking time out of their busy schedules to train her. The worst hour and a half of their days. She didn’t figure they were going to forgive her for lying to them about her memory situation any time soon. 

Hands up in front of her face, Myfanwy faced Teddy again. Their stance was always relaxed. Like they couldn’t be bothered to keep their guard up when facing her. Infuriating, yes. Hurtful even. But not untrue. Even relaxed as they always were, Myfanwy couldn’t land a single blow. 

Only one Gestalt body was present during sessions. Always on some rotation schedule Myfanwy couldn’t pin down. She saw a pattern, she just wasn’t certain what that pattern was. Her past self would probably spot it a mile away. 

She lunged at Teddy, aiming for his left. She’d come close to striking them on that side. Unfortunately, she was only getting slower the longer she trained. Her arms were growing sluggish and heavy. Teddy less so. He grabbed her elbow and pulled her forward over his foot sending her face down into the mats again. 

Myfanwy didn’t move her arms up fast enough and smacked her face into the mats. Not as hard as if she’d hit the bare floor. Still, enough to split her lip at the corner. She rolled to the side and wiped at the blood dribbling down. She groaned softly and shoved herself back onto her feet to face them again. 

Teddy frowned at the smear of blood on her face. She could imagine a flicker of regret on their face, but it was impassive. Unaffected. 

“Make sure you catch yourself when you fall.” Teddy’s eyes kept moving over to the split in her lip. 

They could be concerned for her safety. They might have been. And if only Myfanwy were able to use that to her advantage. Surely her past self had been able to do that, too. What she wouldn’t give for a memory of the past that wasn’t utterly baffling. Like when she’d sparred with Eliza a few weeks back and suddenly thought she had pink streaks in her hair. Myfanwy had kept it to herself lest they start to think she was losing what marbles she had left. 

Teddy tossed her to the ground once more. She fell softer this time. They held onto her until she was almost completely on the mat and dropped her on her side instead of face down. Or she was imagining it. 

“Alright. I’ve wasted enough time. Go shower.” They jerked their head toward the locker rooms. “Maybe stop at the infirmary and check your face.” 

Myfanwy narrowed her eyes at him, but they were already walking away to the men’s locker rooms on the opposite side of the gym. She kicked at the mats in frustration. She hated that they were holding such a grudge against her. All for something that happened when she was literally days old. 

She stopped at the sinks and rinsed the blood out of her mouth. Once she wiped the dried blood from her face, she could see it wasn’t so bad. Already scabbing over. She hopped into the showers and shut her eyes. Maybe they were more upset with being sentenced to training duties. They complained about it enough. 

Ingrid didn’t understand why she wanted to be a field agent so badly. Nobody really did. Nobody else there had ever been kidnapped and jabbed with needles and auctioned off. Nobody there had to see a scared little girl sat in a chair and waiting for her kidnappers to sell her. Pray that whatever monster bought her was slightly less monstrous than others that might use her for more than her EVA. Nobody else had been in that van with her. 

Myfanwy walked into Conrad’s office, freshly showered. It had been months since the bridge. Conrad was still unfamiliar with his new role. Still struggling to figure out the ropes and hold them all down at the same time. He was unsurprised to see her. 

“What can I do for you this morning, Miss Thomas?” _Miss_ Thomas. Not Rook. Despite performing all her old duties as well as the new training to become a field agent, Conrad had ‘temporarily’ suspended her court status. 

“Assign a new trainer to me.” 

Conrad looked up from his paperwork. There was a pensive look on his face as he played with his pen between his fingers. Finally, he set the pen down and leaned toward her in his chair. “Do you know that no field operative in this building wanted to take on the task of training you. The normal combat trainers all refused after learning you were responsible for the bodies at the bridge. They all feared for their safety. You were still adamant that you wanted to be a field agent. Something that requires combat training.” Conrad stood up from his desk and moved around it to lean against the front. “I was left with the option to deny your request and face those repercussions or send you to New Glengrove to train instead.” 

Myfanwy crossed her arms over her chest. “So, you compromised and ordered Gestalt to train me. I get it, but-" 

“I didn’t order Gestalt to do anything. I explained the predicament at the court meeting the following day and explained that forcing you to return to New Glengrove to stay until such a time as you were a qualified field agent might have dangerous ramifications. Gestalt volunteered to train you here instead.” 

Myfanwy stared at him for a moment. Gestalt who complained constantly every time she stayed down a second longer than they liked. The same Gestalt that could barely stand to be near her unless they were throwing her into the mats over and over again. The same Gestalt that acted like she was the last person in the world they wanted to spend any time with whatsoever. _That_ Gestalt had volunteered to train her so she wouldn’t be sent away. 

Myfanwy nodded slowly and tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear. “Alright. So, no new trainer, then.” She excused herself and walked stiffly back to her office. 

Ingrid came in and started her on a fresh dose of mindnumbing paperwork for the day. A day that dragged on excruciatingly. By the time it was over, Myfanwy’s arms were completely dead. She knew she couldn’t go straight home. She had a new, personal mission. 

“What is it?” Robert’s voice asked from inside their office. They didn’t look up from the form on their desk as Myfanwy stepped inside. 

She decided to wait. No reason to agitate them by keeping them from finishing their work. She watched as their hand moved quickly through the form and knew she’d be going over it the following day when Ingrid set it on her desk. At last, Gestalt looked up at her. 

They blinked at her before their brow pulled in. A crease formed between their dark eyebrows. “Myfanwy?” 

“Did you use to have pink hair?” She blurted. 

Gestalt squinted at her. “What?” 

“Not,” Myfanwy gestured at Robert’s body, “not this body. Eliza’s. Did Eliza ever have pink hair?” 

Gestalt’s eyebrows raised and they dropped their eyes from hers. “Long time ago. Back when we were kids. Why do you ask?” 

Myfanwy swallowed and clasped her hands together in front of her. “Just... I think I remembered it. Wasn’t sure.” 

They nodded slowly before leaning forward and resting their arms on their desk. “Any other memories come up?” 

Myfanwy grimaced and looked at the floor. “They’re mostly vague. I remember trying to start a fire using two sticks and I couldn’t get it until... I think it was Alex? You helped. You put your hands over mine and showed me how, but I just wanted you to keep holding my hands.” She blushed as she realized the words she was saying too late. She jerked her head up to look at them. 

Robert was smiling that small, sad smile of theirs. “Wish I’d known that then.” 

Myfanwy swallowed hard and looked away again. “I wanted to say thank you. For training me. I know you hate it, but it does mean a lot to me.” 

“I don’t hate it.” 

Myfanwy smirked at them. “Sure, you don’t. That’s why you complain about doing it every five minutes.” 

Gestalt looked at their desk. “I don’t hate it. I wouldn’t do it if I hated it.” 

Suddenly emboldened, Myfanwy decided to try for something she’d been working toward for months. “I remember more when.... That is to say, the memories I have recovered I did when we were training. I feel like I could remember more if we did other things. Maybe we could spend more time together? I might remember more. I... I _want_ to remember more.” 

Another small, sad smile. “I have some work to finish tonight.” 

Myfanwy nodded, fighting back the extreme disappointment. “Right. Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.” She fled and headed straight for her car. She was halfway there when someone stepped out of the shadows towards her. Her heart lurched in her chest and she leapt away. 

“Myfanwy, Myfanwy!” Alex called out. “It’s me!” 

Myfanwy took a deep breath and waited for her heart to restart. Alex chuckled at her terror and shook their shaggy head. 

“I thought you had work to finish,” she accused. 

Alex shrugged. “Not four bodies worth of work.” They started towards her car. “Let’s go see if we can’t jog some more memories.” 

Myfanwy smiled and followed after, hitting the lock on her keys. “Are you volunteering to spend time with me?” 

Gestalt met her eyes evenly. “As much as I have.” 


	26. Eggnog

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another Checquy Christmas party.

Gestalt as not a holiday person. They were not a party person. They were not an events person. They were not any combination of the three. And yet,  somehow they always ended up at  Checquy events and holiday parties putting on the usual act. They enjoyed being there. They were having fun. All the while burning inside and counting the minutes before they could make their escape.

“Try the eggnog,” Myfanwy suggested, holding a cup of it herself.

They were crowding the drinks table. All four bodies took cups of the stuff. They knew one of the men in accounting had dumped a bottle of rum in the bowl. Myfanwy seldom steered them wrong. Especially in recent years. If she thought they should try the eggnog, they’d try the eggnog. There was a slightly alcoholic aftertaste, but was otherwise a normal cup of eggnog.

Myfanwy downed her cup and went back for more. Gestalt followed suit. Myfanwy paused after they filled their third cups. She stared down at it thoughtfully.

“You now, I put in a whole bottle of vodka and I can’t even taste it.”

Gestalt frowned at her. “What do you mean you put a bottle of vodka in it?”

Myfanwy giggled and put her hand to her flushed cheek. “Oh, yeah. I spiked the eggnog.”

Gestalt shook their head. “No. What’s ‘is face in accounting spiked it with rum. I watched ‘im.” 

Myfanwy scowled at the cup. “Then it should be plenty alcoholic and I don’t feel the slightest bit tipsy.”

Gestalt had no idea what she was talking about. It felt like all four of their bodies were vibrating. They needed to sit down. Maybe her EVA made her react better to alcohol or something. Burn off the effects better or something. 

_ Hmm. Doesn’t make sense. _

Myfanwy was wandering away from them. They stumbled after her. The room was tilting back and forth aggressively. They clung to the walls as they moved. Myfanwy managed to move without any assistance. Completely unfazed by the concoction. She called the lift and started up for the offices. Gestalt leaned heavily against the rails and waited for the ride to end.

Myfanwy stepped out and stared around for a moment before moving down the hall for her office. Gestalt followed. More curious than anything else. Myfanwy sat in one of the white armchairs in her office and leaned her head against the backrest. Gestalt sat on the other chair and all over the floor. Myfanwy looked down at Eliza, laying on their back at her feet.

“Um.... Eggnog....” She blinked hard and spilled forward out of the armchair. Gestalt caught her and settled her on the floor alongside them.

“Eggnog,” they agreed, solemnly.

Myfanwy rolled to the side and twisted a lock of their hair around her finger. Around and around and around until her hand settled against their cheek. She felt so soft. Her hand was cool against their cheek, but it was perfect.

“I’ve told you that you’re my best friend.”

Gestalt grinned and shook their head. “Never.”

Myfanwy pursed her lips and slipped her finger free of their hair. “Well, you are. My best friend.”

“You’re my best friend, too.”

Myfanwy smiled and wriggled closer to wrap her arms around them in the world’s most awkward, drunken floor hug. She pressed her forehead against theirs and shut her eyes for a moment. Gestalt wanted to kiss her. They could kiss her. Her eyes were shut. She wasn’t even an inch away.

As if reading their thoughts, her eyes opened. She stared at them for a moment. Electricity charged the air. Her eyes fluttered shut again and she tipped her head toward them to brush their lips together. Gestalt’s breath caught in their throats. They kissed her back slowly. Hesitantly.

She was so sweet. They could taste the eggnog on her tongue. Feel her hands on their waist. Their leg. Sliding up beneath their skirt. She felt so good. So soft. They wanted everything else in the world to stop except what was happening in that office.

They pried their eyes open the next morning to light streaming onto their face through the office window. Myfanwy snored lightly against their shoulder. Robert’s shoulder. They thought they could still feel her lips pressed against theirs, but now they weren’t so sure it wasn’t a dream. An incredible dream they wanted to continue.

They let out a soft groan as the harsh throbbing in their skulls set in full force. Their bones cracked as they began to shift and sit up. Their necks hurt from sleeping on the floor. Myfanwy pinched her face up and let out a small whimper before opening her eyes.

“Robert?” She sat up and looked around.

“Shh,” they argued. Their ears were ringing.

Myfanwy moaned and threw herself back onto the floor. “Eggnog. Never again.”

Gestalt nodded seriously. “Never again.”

If they ever actually kissed Myfanwy in real life, they wanted to be sober for the experience. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I already did the 'Gestalt and Myfanwy already kissed but they were so drunk they forgot' thing before, but I'm unoriginal and this is what you get.


	27. Day In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pillow talk.

Myfanwy moaned into her pillow. She felt the bed dip as one of Gestalt’s bodies moved to shut off the alarm. Teddy kissed her bare shoulder and settled their large hand at the small of her back. They were teasing her, she knew. At any minute they were going to all roll out of bed and start haranguing her to get a move on so they could do their  five mile jog before breakfast. There was no sleeping in in Gestalt’s book. Move it or lose it.

“Time to get up, love,” Teddy murmured before nibbling at her earlobe. 

Myfanwy grinned and slid her hand up their leg tantalizingly. “I’ll get  _ you _ up.”

Gestalt started to move off the bed then. Teddy’s hand caught hers and lifted it to their lips. She could hear them all getting ready. Set in their routine. Myfanwy refused to open her eyes. Maybe she could get them all to run without her. Or better, come back to bed. She opened her eyes and looked up at Teddy. His hair hung haphazardly about his stern face.

“What if we didn’t run today?”

Teddy frowned down at her. “We run every day. You know that.”

Myfanwy rolled onto her back and stretched, arching her back as she did. She flopped back onto the mattress. “But what if we didn’t run today? What if we just stayed in?”

Gestalt frowned at her. “Routines beget habits. Running  every day is a good habit to get into.”

“I’m not saying we don’t run ever again. I’m saying what if we don’t run  _ today _ ?” She dragged her index finger across Teddy’s collar bone. 

“And do what instead?” 

Myfanwy grinned and wriggled closer to them. “Well, we could start by sleeping another hour or so. Rest is important.” She tapped the end of Teddy’s nose with her finger before returning to their collar bone. “Then we could shower and cook up some breakfast. Maybe watch the news. Maybe do... something else?” She moved her finger down their chest, circled their belly button, and kept moving south. Gestalt grabbed her hand at the last second.

“You just don’t want to get out of bed,” they accused.

Myfanwy pouted. “Maybe not. That doesn’t mean I couldn’t make it worth your while.”

“What if I’m not tired?”

Myfanwy puckered her lips in thought as she played with Teddy’s calloused fingers. “I suppose I could wear you out a bit. As long as that counts as our jogging.”

Gestalt arched their brow at her. “I put in more work than you do.”

Myfanwy drew her eyebrows together and sat up. “You do  _ not _ .”

Teddy ran their hand down her thigh to her knee before slowly dragging it back up. They stopped at her scars to run their fingers over them gently. A move that always gave Myfanwy chills.

“Four times as much work.”

Myfanwy kicked their hand away and yanked the blanket over her head. “Go on your fucking run, then.”

Gestalt tugged the blanket down over her head. Myfanwy could smell Eliza’s lilac and lavender perfume without opening her eyes. Their soft hand settled on her cheek. 

“It’s Sunday. We don’t have anywhere to be. And you’ve been working very hard these past few months, so we can have a day in if that’s what you want.”

Myfanwy blinked at them. “Does that mean we can sleep in?”

Eliza kissed her slowly. Drawing her in. Myfanwy shifted closer. After a few minutes, they pulled back and smiled at her. “You can sleep. I’m going to start on breakfast and get some extra work finished.”

Myfanwy rolled her eyes. “A day in normally frowns upon work of any kind.”

Gestalt brushed her hair back from her face and smiled at her. “Well, you are welcome to distract me.” They kissed her again. “But that might get in the way of your nap.”

Myfanwy gripped  Eliza’s ass in both hands and pulled her in. “Nap schmap. I’ll show you who puts in more work.”

Gestalt giggled and nipped at Myfanwy’s neck in a short struggle for dominance that Myfanwy knew they let her win. She didn’t care. Points were going to be made. Like they were equal parts of the relationship and Myfanwy put in just as much effort as they did.

They spent the whole day holed up in Gestalt’s flat. They barely spent more than a few minutes outside of the bedroom. And several points were made. Over and over again. By midday, they were  _ all _ out for a nap.


	28. Cold Hands, Warm Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Extended version of Myfanwy's memory from the letter in Ep 8.

It was a nasty day for a training exercise. A Capture the Flag sort of exercise. Seven paired teams. Seven flags. Seven miles. And on mile three the skies opened up and started dumping on them. They wiped the rain from their eyes and kept going. Myfanwy was falling behind. They grabbed her sleeve and pulled her along with them.

They were almost to the top of the hill when Myfanwy caught a patch of mud and went down. She slid three or so feet before stopping and scrambling up after them. They grabbed her wrist this time to keep a better hold on her. The rain was pouring down all over. They saw a small crop of overhanging rocks that might offer some protection from the rain. It would be stupid and dangerous to try and continue in the downpour.

Myfanwy slipped again when they let go of her. This time, she caught herself on the rocks at the back of the overhang and managed to keep herself out of the mud. They turned to watch the rain for the first sign that they could make another break for it. 

Myfanwy was quiet behind them. She was normally much chattier. They glanced back at her wondering if she’d hurt herself when she fell. She was huddled against the rocks shivering. Gestalt saw her breath in the crisp air. It was cold and they were soaked through and would be for hours. They looked back out at the rain, pushing their floppy hair out of their face again. It didn’t show a sign of stopping any time soon. Even their other bodies on other teams had taken refuge from the storm.

Myfanwy was breathing loudly on her hands and rubbing them together desperately. Gestalt turned to her again. She had her hands cupped to her mouth and huffed into them. Three of Gestalt’s bodies ran a bit hotter. Something about female anatomy made them more susceptible to the cold. Not that Gestalt minded the cold even with their Eliza body. They could block out that aspect of the body by focusing on the other three bodies’ temperatures instead. Which was what they were doing then. Myfanwy didn’t have that luxury.

“Here.” They reached out their hands for hers.

Myfanwy eyed them skeptically. She slowly placed her hands in theirs. They smiled at her reassuringly. Her hands were so small they fit entirely inside theirs. It was like holding two large ice cubes. Gestalt bent their head and blew hot breath into their clasped hands and trapping the heat inside.

“Sorry,” Myfanwy said. “About.... I’m slowing you down.”

Gestalt shook their head flinging water droplets around and dropping their floppy hair back into their eyes. “Rain’s slowing us down. All my other teams have stopped for the rain, too. Not sure about the last three, but I’d assume they stopped to wait out the rain, too. Running in this is just asking for trouble.”

Myfanwy looked over their shoulder out at the rain. It was such a thick sheet that they could barely make out the mile marker across the way. A crack of lightning shot through the sky and thunder shook the ground shortly after. Myfanwy flinched.

“Is that the third marker or the fourth?” She had to shout to be heard over the rain.

“Half through the third. It’s green, not orange.” 

Myfanwy squinted at it and nodded. “Halfway then.”

“How are you?”

Myfanwy’s blue eyes turned to theirs. They hadn’t been paying attention to just how close they were standing until then. Their heartbeats picked up.

“I’m wet.” 

Gestalt tried in vain to keep their thoughts pure. Myfanwy let out a short giggle.

“Absolutely soaked. Fat lot of good the  Glengrove tracksuits do,” she continued. “Your hands are warmer than this shit.”

Gestalt licked their lips, tasting the rain water that had caught there. “You took a pretty bad fall earlier. You alright?”

Myfanwy looked down at herself. The front of her tracksuit was covered in mud. She slipped her hands from theirs and grabbed the hem of her jacket. Gestalt was determined to keep themselves calm and collected. She lifted the jacket and revealed her stomach now covered in scratches. Gestalt could see a bruise forming on one side. They grimaced.

“Not too bad considering,” Myfanwy said, pulling her jacket back into place. She rolled up one of the sleeves. Her forearm was much worse. Even she grimaced. She’d skinned a large portion of it all the way to her elbow. “ _ That _ hurts.” Myfanwy pulled her sleeve back down carefully so as to keep the mud out of the wound.

“Maybe we should take it slow going the rest of the way once the rain’s let up.”

Myfanwy turned sharp eyes on them. “Fuck that. I want to win.”

“You’re hurt.”

“I’ll be fine.” 

Gestalt would have argued with her further, but by then it was well established that Myfanwy somehow  _ always  _ got her way. One way or another. They shook their head and went to watch the rain again. Waiting for a break in the weather.

The moment the rain let up to a slight drizzle, they took off. Gestalt kept ahold on her wrist so they could keep her from losing her footing again. She didn’t seem to mind. Their other teams waited a few minutes more. They couldn’t control the other three teams, but Myfanwy wanted to win and they wanted to make that happen.

The seven flags were at the top of at tower comprised of steel bars welded together. They started the climb for the one on the lowest bar. The rain made the bars slippery. They saw another team start up for the same flag. It was closest. Easiest to grab. Gestalt grabbed Myfanwy’s foot as it slipped off one of the bars and settled it back on the bar. She snagged the flag just as the other team reached for it.

Quickly, they scrambled back down to lock the flag into their team’s marker and ring the bell. Myfanwy threw her hands up and squealed excitedly at their victory. She turned and threw her arms around Gestalt. They couldn’t stop their own smile from spreading over their face. They squeezed her back before she gave a cry and shoved them away.

Gestalt held up their hands in surrender. She grimaced and rubbed the spot over her bruise. Gestalt wanted to kick themselves. They would as soon as they got two bodies together. How could they forget she was hurt?

It took around fifteen minutes for the other teams to arrive and lock in their flags. Myfanwy sat on one of the wet benches beside them and shut her eyes. The trees around them offered a small reprieve from the rain that had started back up. Once the final flag was locked in, a van pulled in on the opposite side of the clearing.

“Special congratulations to Miss Thomas and Robert. Shop privileges will be awarded at the end of the week.” They loaded back into the van. Cold. Wet. Weary. Myfanwy leaned her head on their shoulder.

“Never would have gotten first if I were paired with anybody but you, Gestalt. You’re the best.” Myfanwy’s  ice cold hands wormed their way between theirs again. A shiver ran through them though their hearts were warmed.


	29. Fireplace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy and Gestalt go looking for Bronwyn.

Myfanwy ran her finger through a fine layer of dust that had settled on the kitchen table. The house was dark. Quiet. Something crashed in the living room. She moved quickly to the doorway in time to see Gestalt looking sheepish while two bodies set to cleaning up a shattered picture frame.

“We’ve been here two minutes and you’re smashing up the place.”

Gestalt slipped the picture free of the glass and settled it on the mantle. “It was an accident. I was reaching for a different picture.”

Myfanwy moved into the room and looked at the collection of framed photos on the mantle. All of them were at least fifteen years old. Like life just stopped in that house at that time.  It still hadn’t come back to it.

“Are you sure your sister’s been living here?” 

Eliza shook out an afghan that had been hanging on the back of the couch. A cloud of dust appeared and settled on the floor. Myfanwy picked up a picture of a her and Bronwyn when they must’ve been three and five. Just kids. Happy and oblivious to where life was going to take them.

“I’m not sure about anything. I know I met her here a few months ago. It was where I got one of my first memories.” She set the photo back on the fireplace and ran her hands up and down her arms. There was no heat in the house and winter was settling into her bones. “I suppose it was foolish to hope she’d be here.”

Alex squeezed her hand in theirs. “It’s not foolish to hope.”

Myfanwy graced them with a small smile before tucking herself into their warm arms. “Foolish to want to see my sister on Christmas even though I can’t remember a single Christmas from the past thirty years.”

Alex pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Maybe she’s on her way back. We can wait for her.”

Myfanwy huffed and stepped out of their embrace. “No one’s been here in months, Gestalt.”

“We can wait anyway. Maybe something else here will spark a memory.” They moved around the house then. Busying themselves with cleaning and straightening things.

Myfanwy made her way into her old bedroom. Her stuffed owl was dropped at the foot of her bed. Her diary sat untouched on the nightstand between hers and Bronwyn’s beds. Myfanwy sat on her bed remembering the last time she was there. Talking with her sister. Trying to figure out her life. Where to go and who to turn to  now that every hated her for her deception. She would have left. She knew that. She would have stayed with Bronwyn and never gone back to the  Checquy . Never laid eyes on Gestalt again.

Except she remembered her childhood friends. The joy. The freedom. The comfortability that came from being with them. She hadn’t recognized it when she felt it earlier in that week. She’d felt it a few times. But she didn’t have enough information to understand it. Not then.

It was so strong. She drove straight back to the  Checquy to try and track them down. To apologize. To try and explain herself though she barely understood it herself. And it was all too late. Gestalt hadn’t wanted to hear a word she said. Much less believe one. She left because she had no choice. Gestalt didn’t see her as Myfanwy anymore. Not since they knew.

She battled with herself over a long, sleepless night. Gestalt didn’t want her there any longer. She didn’t have a place in her old life without her memories. So, she decided to leave. To go with her sister like Farrier and Bronwyn had planned all along. Myfanwy had been proud of herself just for making it to the docks. She wasn’t going to make it any further. She’d chosen at last.

Myfanwy chose Gestalt over her own sister. And she was punished for that decision by being abducted by the  Lugat and sold to the Chinese. Maybe she would never stop being punished for that decision. Maybe she would never see her sister again.

“I started a fire in the fireplace. Some warmth at least. While we wait.” Eliza leaned against the door jam and smiled at her easily.

Myfanwy nodded and got to her feet. “You shouldn’t have. We don’t have to stay.”

Eliza grabbed Myfanwy’s hands up in theirs. “It’s Christmas. If your sister doesn’t show her face here, we’ll hunt her down.”

Myfanwy let them lead her out to the living room where they had set up camp in front of the fireplace. Complete with hot chocolate she had no idea where they found. She sat down in the middle of them and leaned back against Teddy’s broad chest.

“Bron’s been hiding for years. What makes you think we can find her?”

“Give me some credit,” Teddy rumbled.

“I found you, didn’t I?”

Myfanwy narrowed her eyes at Robert. “ _ I _ called  _ you _ .”

Gestalt shrugged. “We’ll find her. If not this Christmas, then the next.”

Alex kissed her cheek. “She’s your family. We’ll do whatever it takes.”

Myfanwy turned and caught Alex’s lips with her own. “You’re my family, too.”

“I love you.”


	30. Coming Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gestalt comes back from an international mission.

It was a long flight home from Romania. Their newest acquisition slept soundly in the seat beside Alex. It was a routine acquisition. Still, they disliked being away from home for so long. It was a  week long stay in Romania while the international permits were finalized and the parents were coerced into entrusting their child into the hands of the  Checquy with promises of brighter futures for them. 

Some part of them always wondered if it was so brusque and unfeeling when their own parents gave them up. They didn’t have very clear memories of that time. Any memories of their mother were heavily blurred. They knew their white hair was a trait she had passed on to them. They had no memories of their father.

The target’s name was Luca. Two years old. He’d have no memories of his parents by the time he was Gestalt’s age. It put an ache in their hearts. They had begun to seriously question the  Checquy’s logic between permanently separating the children from their families. Some families obviously had no interest in the children. The runaways, the orphans, the scorned. But there were children like Luca that still had parents that loved them very much and grieved for their loss. Parents like Myfanwy had. 

Their thoughts turned again to their own parents. Did their mother mourn when they were taken away from her? Was she even more distraught than these other parents? While they lost one child, their mother lost four. Never to be seen again. It was a rabbit hole. They could fall in it forever.

The plane landed at the private airport and Gestalt moved the child from the plane to their car without waking him. He was fastened quickly into the car seat in the back of their Range Rover. It was cramped with all four bodies and the car seat, but they made do.  Glengrove was on the other side of London. About a forty minute long drive in the dead of night.

Luca slept the whole time.

The headmaster met them outside. Only two bodies went with the child. Gestalt new the routine. The first stop was going to be the infirmary for blood tests and a physical. Standard procedure before the EVA children could be placed with the general population. Dormitories for the older children and the nursery for toddlers like Luca. They knew all of this, but they were remiss to see him so brutally awoken.

“Surprised you aren’t running along home, Rook Gestalt.” The headmaster led them through the halls towards the infirmary. Gestalt shifted Luca’s weight in their arms as they carried him. 

“I’ll be stopping by the office after we’re finished here.” They looked at the row of vials soon to be filled with Luca’s blood. “Finish the report while it’s still fresh.”

The headmaster nodded patiently. “You can leave the boy here. The doctor will be in shortly. She’s a bit sluggish in the middle of the night.”

Gestalt shook their heads. “I’ll wait with him. I’m in no rush.”

The headmaster looked between them, but Gestalt outranked him in every way. There was naught he could do to argue. Gestalt sat in the chairs in the room and held Luca against their chest as they waited. It was another twenty minutes before the doctor came in. She was fresh faced which was surprising given it was after midnight.

“I heard he was a magnet.” She smiled and brushed Luca’s dark hair from his face. “Oh. He’s a sweet little thing.”

“He’s worn out from the trip.” 

The doctor nodded and slid up the sleeve on his shirt, grabbing an alcohol swab to clean the crook of his arm. “Luckily,  _ I _ am very good. If I do this just right he won’t wake up until morning when he’s safe in his bed in the nursery surrounded by the other curious kiddos.”

The doctor was right. She was very good. Luca barely stirred as she filled the necessary vials and took his vitals. She sat back and smiled proudly. “All signs are good. I’ll wait a week or so to do his vision and hearing tests. Let him get comfortable.”

She led Gestalt down to the nursery where six other babies slept. They tucked Luca into an empty crib and left, heading into the office to draw up the paperwork. It was a quick process with four of them to work at once. They knew all the questions like the back of their heads by then. It was two in the morning by the time they started home. It was a Saturday. They wouldn’t be expected at the office.

Myfanwy was curled in the large armchair in the living room when they opened the door. She snuffled as they disarmed the alarm. Gestalt smiled tenderly. She was waiting for them.

Her eyes blinked open. Her hand reached out and grabbed one of theirs. “Hey, you.”

“What are you doing out here?”

Myfanwy yawned and stretched, sitting up. “Waiting for you.”

“I told you I wouldn’t be back until really late.”

Myfanwy shrugged. “Some forces are stronger than logic.”

A thundering of bare feet slapped against the hardwood floors down the hallway. They stopped at the living room. “ _ DADDIES _ !” 

Gestalt turned as a cluster of tiny missiles launched themselves into three of Gestalt’s arms. They were heavier than Luca had been. Older. Almost five already. They dropped to the ground dramatically.

“Oh no! I’m being attacked!” They cried.

“This is what I get for coming home?” 

Cerys, the smallest, sat up on  Teddy’s chest and put her hands on either side of their face. “We missed you too much, Daddies.”

“That’s right!”  Llewella agreed. “So, now we have to fight.”

Gestalt laughed at that. They grabbed up the girls’ wrists in their hands and tickled them with the others. They lifted Gareth up by his ankles and tickled him, too. They squealed and squirmed and giggled madly.

“Oh? We have to fight? You sure you want to fight me?” 

Myfanwy wrapped her hands around their waist and rested her head on their shoulder. “You know,  _ I _ missed you, too.”

They turned in her arms and settled their hands on her waist. “Oh no. Does that mean we have to fight, too?”

Myfanwy kissed them slowly. They were occupying the kids’ full attentions with their tickling match. A hearty distraction, but they weren’t sure how long they’d be able to keep it up.

“I’d say it’s more like wrestling with a few added benefits.”

Gestalt straightened up and hoisted the triplets into their arms. “Bedtime. Way past bedtime.”

“No!”

“Dad- _ dies _ !” 

“Not fair!”

“Yes, fair. If we don’t sleep, I’ll be too tired to make welcome home waffles in the morning. You troublemakers still like welcome home waffles, don’t you?” Eliza reasoned.

Gestalt settled the kids on their feet outside their bedrooms. They went obediently to their beds and tucked themselves in. Myfanwy was already in their bedroom when they reached it. They draped their arms around her waist and kissed her neck.

“Oh no. What about the welcome home waffles in the morning?” Myfanwy protested.

Gestalt yanked her tank top up over her head. “Forget waffles. I want to hear more about your ‘special wrestling.’”

Myfanwy laughed and curled her arms around their neck. She kissed them lightly before backing towards the bed. “You might like the waffles better.”

Gestalt followed her onto their enormous mattress. Two King mattresses pushed together. They kissed everywhere they could reach. “Never.”

Myfanwy grabbed Robert’s face as they kissed her jaw. “Welcome home.”


	31. New Year's Eve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Myfanwy spends the night looking for someone.

The party was in full effect. Ten minutes to midnight. Most people were leagues beyond drunk. What a way to ring in the New Year. Myfanwy couldn’t believe it could be this hard to find someone. Especially someone with four bodies. She only needed one.

“Ah, Myfanwy! How are you finding tonight’s celebration?” Conrad stepped in front of  her, champagne glass in hand. He was beaming at her. 

Myfanwy forced a smile onto her face and nodded. “It’s been great.” Her eyes darted around. Searching the crowd.

“I don’t see a glass in your hand. How are you going to toast the New Year?” 

Myfanwy tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I was on my way to find one, actually.” She made to step around him, but Conrad stepped in front of her again.

“Isn’t the bar the other way?” Conrad nodded back behind her. 

Myfanwy glanced over her shoulder and gave a sheepish giggle. “Oh, right.” She tapped the side of her head with her index finger. “Losing my mind.” She turned on her heel and started towards the bar again. She’d only just come from there.

Four bodies with gleaming white hair should not be so difficult to spot. Unless they were intentionally hiding from her. She ground her teeth together and veered away from the bar striding towards the balcony instead. It was freezing outside, but the cold air was good. It helped clear her head.

She leaned against the balcony railing and shut her eyes for a moment. It would probably be best if she didn’t find Gestalt until well after midnight. Better if she didn’t see them at all  until they were back at work two days from then. She felt her nose and ears numbing from the cold winds and figured she’d cleared her head enough.

“What’re you doing out here?” 

Myfanwy jumped and spun around to face Teddy. He tilted their head at her curiously. Patiently. She wondered if they were as drunk as the rest of the party guests. As drunk as she had been. Myfanwy leaned back against the railing and smiled at them.

“Just clearing my head.” She looked down at the pavilion below and took a breath before looking back at Teddy. “What about you? What are you doing out here?”

Teddy took a small step forward. “Looking for you.”

Myfanwy’s heart jumped. Her head wasn’t as clear as she thought it was. Teddy slowly stepped closer to her until they were practically on top of her. She stared up at them and prayed she didn’t look as ridiculous as she felt. As completely turned on.

“New year, yeah?” Teddy’s voice was  quiet now. Soft. Myfanwy’s breath caught in her throat. “Any resolutions?”

Myfanwy swallowed down the tightness in her throat and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, of course I do.”

Teddy set his hand on the railing beside hers. She could feel the heat from his hand though he wasn’t touching her. “Like what?”

Myfanwy licked her lips. She knew she had made resolutions. She clearly remembered making them. Just then, all she could think about was what it would feel like to kiss them. To hold them. To fuck them. She shook her head to clear herself of those thoughts. Dangerous thoughts.

“I want to bring in a target myself this year. Find an EVA myself. Prove that I can be just as much of a Rook as you are.”

Teddy pursed his lips thoughtfully. “You don’t have to do all that. You’re already a respected Rook. Even if you don’t go into the field.”

Myfanwy shook her head. “No. I... I  _ want _ to do more. I even made a list of potential targets. People that are likely EVAs with... subdued powers. Like there’s this woman that’s won the lottery three times in the past year alone. And other weird, fortunate things have happened to her. And another woman predicts the stock market with needlepoint precision. And a man that has-”

“You don’t seriously believe any of those people are actual EVAs, do you?”

Myfanwy scowled. Farrier had told her much the same thing when she’d suggested it a month ago. Myfanwy was determined to see through the list no matter what it took. She’d prove herself.

“Well, what about you, then?” She challenged.

“Me?”

“Yes, you. What’s  your resolution?” 

Teddy’s hand moved on the railing until it was covering hers. Behind them, the partygoers started shouting out the countdown to the New Year. Teddy’s other hand came up to cup Myfanwy’s cheek. She didn’t think she’d ever seen them look so determined.

“I want to end next year doing the same thing I plan on starting it with.” 

The hall erupted into a cheer of Happy New Years! 

“Wha-”

Teddy’s mouth fell onto hers. Myfanwy took a deep breath in through her nose and opened her mouth to taste them. She leaned into them and pulled them closer. Myfanwy remembered suddenly that they were still in full view of everyone at the party. Drunk or not. She pushed Gestalt back and put her hand to her mouth.

“We should get back to the party, don’t you think?” Myfanwy stammered. She could see the disappointment and fear in their eyes. She grinned at them and squeezed their hand with hers. “Happy New Year, Gestalt.”

Teddy returned the squeeze. “Happy New Year, Myfanwy.”

If they were anywhere else, she might never have stopped kissing them. If she’d had that drink Conrad suggested she might’ve done more than kiss them. Instead, she wound her way back into the party for another twenty minutes before quietly returning home alone. 

Maybe she’d match her resolution to Gestalt’s. Maybe she’d end this new year doing what she started it with. With  _ who _ she started it with. A smile played on her lips as she lay in bed. Her fingers whispered over where Teddy’s lips had been. Where their tongue had been. She closed her eyes and dreamed of a much more exciting new years and hoped that it was a  prophecy of the new year to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did it! 31 days of writing every day! Okay. so it was actually more like 26 days because I started late, but that's 31 prompts in the bag! Yay!!!  
> Thank you all so much for reading! Happy New Year!! 2020 baby!!!


End file.
